Planning a wedding can feel like very intense process and the number of thing you need to think about, combined with the financial pressure and the desire to impress and leave a lasting impression on your guests can make the whole thing extremely stressful.
Keeping an open mind about the type of wedding you want can help a great deal. If you have your heart set on every detail of your ‘dream’ wedding before you start you are almost certain to be disappointed. If you are open to new ideas and willing to adapt to what’s available to you then you might be happily surprised with what you find, especially if you are managing a tight budget. Here are just a few areas where being flexible can save you money and stress.
The Wedding Dress
Buying a traditional white wedding dress from a specialist wedding retailer might seem like the simplest way to get started but wedding dresses are very, very expensive and a bridal retailer is never going to be the cheapest option. If you find yourself thinking ‘How much?! I’m only going to wear it once!!’ then it might be time to consider ditching the white and shopping around for a non-traditional option. Black, red, blue and even camo wedding gowns are becoming more and more popular among brides who choose to be different and, once you turn away from bridal specialists and start looking at ballroom, prom and other collections then you might be surprised at the amount of choice you now have, a lot of them at a substantially lower cost.
The Venue
After the dress, the wedding and reception venues are going to be the biggest concern on many bride’s minds, and this is something that can really eat into the budget of even the most frugal minded. Searching for a venue that hosts weddings, especially for large groups, limits the choice and increases the price tag immediately. There are two main ways to combat this:
Consider making a small wedding party. A small, intimate group of family and friends, hand picked because they are important to the happy couple can make for a much more meaningful experience that a huge groups of long lost relatives and plus-ones. This will immediately increase your choice of venues as places that wouldn’t usually host wedding receptions might open their doors to a small group if you approach them to ask.
Consider non-traditional options. Once again, a move away from the usual venues can see a big decrease in price. Have you a family member who would be willing to host the reception? Can you arrange an outdoor gathering? A BBQ? Think about what you might enjoy and look into the options available.
The wedding dress and reception venue are often the biggest things on a couple’s mind (or just the bride’s mind!) but savings can be made in many other areas of the wedding planning in a similar way – simply by disregarding the easy and traditional and looking around for alternatives that might work just as well. Not only does this cut the cost, it also removes the pressure to ‘compete’ and can add whole lot of fun to the planning process.
No comments yet.