3 Ideas for Planning a Low-cost Wedding ceremony

Does this sound dramatic? When my spouse and I mentioned “I do” and drove off to our honeymoon, we sighed with aid. It felt like we’d simply survived wedding-planning jiu-jitsu throughout a zombie apocalypse. Wait … yeah, that does sound a bit dramatic. However it’s how we felt. 

When Liv and I received engaged in October 2019, we had no thought what was coming in 2020. The pandemic made wedding ceremony planning contain discussions about temp-scanning the foreheads of our friends and never internet hosting a super-spreader celebration. Navigating pandemic rules turned a headache for each of us.

Olivia and I now chortle about it, as a result of that headache enabled us to see and say no to a whole lot of the fluff in our wedding ceremony wishes—particularly those that didn’t contribute to the true that means of marriage. In essence, we stumbled upon having an affordable wedding ceremony, spending time on the components of our upcoming marriage that mattered greater than the marriage. 

Planning an affordable wedding ceremony

There are numerous items to consider when contemplating wedding ceremony prices. However simply how we didn’t let a pandemic cease us from tying the knot, don’t let the price of a marriage cease you. Listed here are 3 tricks to contemplate when making an attempt to plan an affordable wedding ceremony. 

Tip #1: Think about your visitor listing.

I do know, I’m going straight to the guts with this one. The visitor listing was an enormous consideration on our funds as a result of it decided how massive of a venue we would have liked to ebook, how a lot meals we would have liked to have, and the little particulars that add as much as accommodate everybody. Principally, the extra friends, the more cash it will price. 

Nevertheless, there have been many variables to think about as we decided our listing: 

• Might we’ve a potluck buffet to decrease the fee for meals?
• Would an out of doors wedding ceremony permit us to accommodate everybody?
• Might we’ve the ceremony and reception at a free location (like a church)?
• Would a weekday wedding ceremony decrease venue charges?
• Might a less-fancy baker (e.g., a grocery retailer) make the cake at a decrease price?

For Olivia and me, it was a difficulty of public well being, so we needed to have a smaller visitor listing. Collectively, we made a number of loving calls to uninvited friends to speak our resolution to have a smaller wedding ceremony, and we despatched out small, low-cost wedding ceremony souvenirs to have fun the day. 

The visitor listing tends to be a sizzling matter so I’ll be trustworthy. Initially, I used to be tossing in a for much longer listing of household, buddies, and associates. Nevertheless, we each made troublesome choices by laborious conversations with one another. The important thing in contemplating the visitor listing was ensuring we made choices in unity, and that a very powerful individual (Jesus) was invited by prayer and honored in our new devotion to 1 one other as a husband and spouse (Ephesians 5:21-28). 

Cashing in in your neighborhood sounds just a little bizarre, however we saved a lot cash from accepting assist moderately than hiring skilled wedding ceremony coordinators.

Positive, it could be simpler to ebook a bundle deal of servers, skilled ushers, and extra, however with our restrict on how many individuals might be within the venue in the course of the pandemic, we needed to assume properly. We requested ourselves:

• Can a pal DJ utilizing a cellular phone and aux?
• Would just a few buddies be keen to function ushers?
• How would possibly our mother and father need to assist?
• Can a pal or relative make our wedding ceremony cake and desserts?
• If not our personal pastor, would an area pastor be keen to officiate without charge or a small price?
• Can just a few family and friends members adorn?

Subsequent to modifying our visitor listing, having neighborhood assist saved probably the most sum of money. To every person who helped, we despatched a thank-you notice with a small, Visa present card tucked inside for appreciation. Reflecting on all they did makes us bear in mind the treasures we discover serving and receiving from the relationships that matter most (Hebrews 10:24-25). 

Tip #3: Save {dollars} within the particulars.

We rapidly discovered that we had been okay with low-cost wedding ceremony purchases right here and there, however these little bills pile up and that occurs quick. By the point the pandemic rules really sunk into the entire planning, we realized we needed to reduce conventional wedding ceremony norms like having folks on the dance flooring. At that time, we had been devoted to solely together with the issues we would have liked or extraordinarily desired. When that occurred, we discovered much more methods to maintain {dollars} in our pockets. It was all within the particulars:

• Join wedding ceremony vendor e mail blasts to identify related reductions and giveaways.
• Hire your tux and/or costume to decrease apparel prices. 
• Get a swimsuit as an alternative of a tux for across the similar worth and longer use. 
• Ship out digital invites to tech savvy family and friends to decrease printing prices.
• Get a smaller wedding ceremony cake.
• Hire a nicer automobile/use your individual for the bride and groom send-off.