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we are having a late cermony so no dinner just a late lunch this really cuts down thethe cost cost.
We're doing a Sunday wedding which brought our venue down from $1300 to $500. Also doing a late lunch with hors d'oeuvres and dessert. Reserved a photog for only 4 hours to cut down the price. DIYing centerpieces and BM bouquets.
We tried to make alternatives instead of replacing. I got married at a private estate that had sound wired all throuought the house and the outdoor dining area , so we used and Ipod and a party radio channel, worked out fantastic. I did not think a d.j was worth the money.
I may know hundreds of people but really only family and my most close friends were who mattered - so a small guest list helps tremendously.
For food we used a mixture of local restaurants to make trays and things of our favorites- MUCH cheaper than using a caterer!
Also we didn't care much about the silver ware and plates etc. We went to our local costco/bjs and bought fancy throw away gear, which was quick, convienant and cost nothing compared to hiring a service to set up, and take down and provide the dinner wear.
I bought a used wedding dress, which saved thousands. I only paid 38 dollars for my dress at a thrift store. It had all the tags and was a casablanca. I altered it myself as well.
I used natural and local decoration and centerpeice things. Pinceonce and spanish moss wreathes, sand from the beach, local tropical plants and flowers harvested the day of the wedding. It saved a boat load! and it was fun to make
I hate photos taken of me , so I did not hire a photog, but for some people that is the most worthy splurge. so if you love photos i reccomend having that be it.
Since we had a small party of people 50-60 and several bars on site, we just stocked them with local favorites and let people make their own. It was a big hit and was cheap. Did not need to hire a bar tender or pay open bar fees etc
Best of luck! Keep your focus on your marriage ( your vows, life spent with partner) , not the "wedding" (tablecloths, food, music etc). It will turn out great!!
We're diy-ing invites, bouquets, and decor, were also having an outdoor wedding and a single tier cake. But above all else we are cutting people! There will be 18 of us on our day. Thank heavens for DWs! :-)
Okay, ours was a little more expensive than this, but we live in an expensive area and did make some substantial cuts....
1) While we totally loved our venue, what sealed the deal was that it it was half off for that paritucular date.... when we were looking we only looked at places offering discounts.
2)Friend photographer... was a little disappointed, not in the photography but that she came and went just to get formal pics, when what I specifically requested was more of the party/reception itself... but I got over it.
3)No flowers. The venue was filled with candles and colored lights and it was beautiful on its own. Had many compliments.
4)We were advised by by the venue's planner not pay for many additional late night snacks like tea or coffee, that people tend to not have any. We just had one round of simple snacks + cake and that was fine.
5)Fun, but not fancy favours.
We cut the wedding...LOL. JK. Okay really, our venue in our hometown was pushing $10k for the total. So we moved the wedding up in time and out of state. We will now be getting married in Hawaii, and our total bill after tax is running about $5,560. MUCH better.
Other things we did: Student photographer. DIY hair and make-up. Off the rack dress without needing alterations.
Not only did I cut things out I made sure things that I bought can be used for more then just the one day.
We are having are wedding at a garden location, we only have to pay the gate price for all our guests (about $13.00 each). We are only having 15 guests, no bridal party, I am making a paper flower bouquet for myself with no other flowers. My dress was bought at a used wedding store, I am doing my own makeup and bought jewelery and shoes that I can wear again. I did get a professional photographer but only for 4 hours, and we are having dinner at a restaurant, without a cake or favors. I haven't decided what I am doing for my hair yet as to DIY or Professional.
We did our wedding off season (end of November) and we saved 60% off of the venue. We also cut the guest list and decided on only immediate family and their plus ones! I DIY'd the invitations and the favors and my mother (who did an amazing job!) DIY'ed the flowers and centerpieces! MY dress was $500, taxes included as we got it off-the-rack at a sale at a local bridal salon. It was STUNNING! One of the perks of the off-season wedding package we got was that they included the honeymoon suite for free the night of our wedding! Our photographer was a steal for $700 (just shy of $800 with taxes) for 7 hours - his normal packages START at $3500! My brother DJ'd the music (using our pre-planned playlist which we played from my iPhone) and handled the speaker/audio setup!
Seriously, tap into the resources around you!
These are a lot of great ideas ladies, thanks! I especially like the ideas of incorporating items I can use again!
I asked my sister (who loves event hosting and weddings) if she had anything left over from her wedding a few years back that I could use with my colors / theme. She was ecstatic and has been an AMAZING help for bargain hunting recently.
We got the best deal on our venue, a barn/lawn for $125. So my advice on that is look for unconventional places that aren't usually used for weddings. They don't have a caterer, florist, etc. that you are required to use.
We are doing a ham and fried chicken buffet style (we aren't formal people) plus all the sides that my family is making and we are putting them in pretty serving dishes from Party City.
We are doing stacks of antique books on each table, our local habitat store has a book sale every other week where they are 25 cents each and another thrift store has them for 10 cents each. All of our mason jars came from FI's parents.
We are getting a small 2 tier cake from a lady who does it as a side business, my friend is going to make 4 dozen cupcakes to supplement for the guests.
If you have a Jo-Anns fabric store near you many times they will take competitor coupons and you can stack coupons. If you have like a 40% off coupon from Hobby Lobby, 40% off from Michael's, and 40% off from AC Moore you can use all three on three different items. I saved a ton on my burlap that way.
The only thing I'm splurging on is an $800 photographer. FI sees no point in paying that much but I showed him a few threads from here about how expensive they can get, that coupled with the fact that it's coming out of my pocket, he simmered down :)
Good luck! Let us know how everything goes! If you see something you like but it's too expensive post a pic of it on the DIY boards, people are more than willing to help you figure out how to make it!
We are eloping abroad and it cut our costs in half. The other PPs have some awesome tips!
I bought a book for super cheap (store was closing) called The DIY Wedding: Celebrate Your Day Your Way and it has WONDERFUL money saving tips and projects you can do.
Don't buy a veil. I made mine for literally $3. Tulle is SO cheap. I found it on sale for .77/yard (it's usually about $1.09).
Buying a used dress is also an option. Or the limited has very beautiful dresses in their final sale. I bought one for our civil ceremony for $50. My FI's grandma is doing the alterations for free. Right now they don't have a lot of options but googling some department store wedding dresses can go a long way. David's Bridal is constantly having sales plus they have a sale and outlet part on their website.
DIY makeup and hair. There are THOUSANDS of youtube videos and you can practice to your hearts content. I'm just doing a French Twist and I found a simple tutorial here. Or if you have a friend who loves doing her own makeup she may be wiling to do yours for free. Or go to a makeup counter, have them do it and buy a $10 lipgloss.
Centerpieces. Combine candles and flowers. You can buy glass containers at the Dollar Tree for $1 each. You can buy them by the case on their website. Or use jars. Ask people to collect jars (pickle, baby food, etc) when they're done using them and give them to you. Then it's free. DIYing your flowers will save tons of money. Just stick to one or two types. I found that Sam's Club had the least expensive bulk flowers. Again, there are lots of tutorials on how to make a bouquet.
You can do silk flowers for your bouquet/boutineers to cut costs. Hobby Lobby constantly has 50% stem sales so my silk boquet cost $35 and I used the higher quality flowers.
Cut the bridal party down. Less flowers, less boutineers, less food the day of, less gifts.
Have your FI wear a suit he already has.
Location. Does anyone have beautiful property you could pop a tent up in? Does anyone for some reason have one of those tents to borrow?
Invites. Keep them simple. Buy scrapbook paper in bulk and find someone with a laser printer. Or I found a pack of 25 David Tuetera invites at JoAnne for $2.50 (they were $20). Michael's has some nice printable invites and they always have 40% coupons. Hoard them.
Look to your friends/family for help. Who has hidden talents? Is someone an excellent baker and could gift your cake? Anyone love crafting to help with DIY projects? Someone who does photography on the side? A chef in the family? Someone who sews to alter your dress? Ask people to help man the iPod for the reception. Ask around you might be surprised what people can help with.
We did a Sunday in March, a wedding cake from Walmart (I think my mom about died, lol), and had DH wear a suit he already had. I got a cheap dress I really didn't like ($100) and did all of the alterations myself. We had a family member do the photography (worst idea ever). No rehearsal dinner, no floral centerpieces, one meal option, cheap wedding bands, and a super cheap honeymoon. Total cost for the entire wedding/honeymoon/attire/gifts was around 2k. Definitely saved money, but almost two years later I still have regrets!
We're not married yet (it's in May), but it's going to be under $4K.
A huge part of that is that it's in Iowa, where things are cheaper. I've also lived in CO, FL, & NY, and I doubt I could have the same wedding for twice that in those states.
The most expensive part of our wedding is the location. We're getting married at a stone lodge at a state park. We reserved the day before for setup, the day after for cleanup and a Sunday brunch, and a cabin (for us to stay at). It includes firewood, and limits us to 84 people total, so we're having family only.
Second, I'm DIYing everything. Except for the groom & best mans outfits. Yeah, I might be crazy.
Skipping save the dates and sending out invitations early. I'll post a how-to for our invites soon. The short version is that I chose a floral print it yourself version from hobby lobby (bought with a 40% off coupon for $16), used a website with free printable invites to create the lettering with more professional looking fonts than I own, altered it in gimp (free software that's a lot like photoshop) to get the exact color I wanted for the monogram, printed them using openoffice (a free word-like program), and then gilded the edges of the invites using a steady hand and a gold marker (24 K gold I think was the brand). The part I haven't done yet is the back because we haven't been able to reserve a block of hotel rooms yet, so it's hard to include maps, directions, etc.
We're doing iTunes for the music. This is cheaper than you think if you spend a few afternoons at the library copying music for free to your computer. We already have great speakers that will work for our small venue. Even for the prelude I'm going nontraditional and including bluegrass and pop songs- for example, I'm going to walk down the aisle to Chantal Kreviazuk's Feels Like Home.
We're only having one attendant each- my sister and my FI's best friend. We're paying for their outfits, which is an added expense, but in our case they paid for our outfits when we were in their weddings, so if that doesn't apply to you you can save that.
I want a fairly simple mermaid dress with a defined waist and an elaborate veil, but I'm plus sized and everything I found remotely like that was ridiculously expensive, so I'm making my dress myself by combining two patterns: The bodice from Vogue's V8648 (which is also my bridesmade's pattern), and the skirt from a costume pattern- B4954 (option C), which is a mermaid skirt with a short train. I'm making a belt I'm going to sew onto the waist of the dress when I'm done hand beading it - it's gold ribbon with a lot of hand beading in our wedding colors on top (pale pink and gold).
I'm making a cathedral length veil. I found a ruffled lace trim at hobby lobby that I like and spent hours cutting off the edge of the trim to sew it to the edge of the veil. I haven't started beading the veil yet, but there will be pale pink and gold beads added to the edging. I may do that last and make it more or less elaborate than I initially planned as time allows.
I'm printing the programs and everything else. I'm making them small, both to fit in pockets and to save on cardstock.
We can't find beige/linen suits we like so we're considering having the guys wear khakis with ivory shirts and brown belts & shoes instead of suits or tuxes.
We're catering ourselves. This is not to save money as much as that I'm allergic to wheat and it's impossible to find allergen-free options here in Iowa. The most expensive part of this is going to be the pork, purchased in bulk from Sam's Club, which FI and his dad will smoke and freeze the weekend before. Instead of showers, we're having a food prep party. A great help is that we have a discount grocery chain here called Aldi's. I found scaled recipes by googling "cater your own wedding" or something like that. We chose wines we could buy in bulk from Sam's Club, and I'm thinking of opting for an assortment of bottled beers rather than getting a keg. A keg might be less expensive, but the leftovers don't last..
The most expensive part of the cake will be the pans, $40!, as we'll be making a flourless chococate cake that uses beans as the main ingredient. I test made several for us already with different frosting options and recipes, and then tested a layer cake for christmas parties. It's very rich, so we'll be using a simple almond buttercream frosting. We're making multiple heights of cake stands using a guide I found on pinterest instead of stacking the layers together (I'm confident about a lot of things, but making a stacked cake with more than two layers that's not lopsided is NOT one of them).
Our favors will be s'mores, (enough for two each, put in cellophane bags purchased from amazon, and doubling as placecards) and we'll end the evening by having those that wish to join us move down to the campground for a bonfire around 9 pm.
One thing I'm waffling on is the china. We could go with disposables (almost every wedding I've been to in Iowa does), but I'm from the south and don't like that very much. We could rent, but it will cost almost as much as buying, so I think I'm going to go with buying china and inexpensive glasses & silverware from dollartree. Recently they've had some gold rimmed china that I like, though it's not availible to just order from the website. ;( At any rate afterwards we'll keep some for parties and either sell the rest or donate it to goodwill. I looked around at second hand stores thinking that mismatched floral china with gold rims would be charming, but each plate costs $1.20! I'm not sure when it became cheaper to buy new than to go with goodwill!?!
I'm skipping the bouquet/garter toss.
I found a fairly new photographer (she's only done a few weddings, but she has a great eye) and she's only charging $500 for the day and a cd with all the images. We have a lot of amateur photogs in the family, so I'm sure we'll have great shots even if our "official" photographer doesn't do a good job.
Flowers- my future sister in law is making a heart shaped bouquet with silk tulips after one I liked on pinterest. The centerpieces are going to be submerged orchids ordered from Sam's club with floating candles on top, in vases from dollar tree fancied up by hotgluing glass candlesticks to the bottom. The tables at the venue are gorgeous wood, so instead of tablecloths I'm going with burlap runners as wide as placemats going across the table the short way instead of the long way.
If I have extra time after all of this I'm going to make DIY a rose runner for the aisle.
My advice? Pinterest for design ideas and tons of DIY.
I found this website through another board for some inspiration http://www.younghouselove.com/wedding-album/
For honeymoon, cruises are very economical especially if you wait until the fall. You can get a 4-5 dayer for $400/ea or less. This includes lodging, 24 hr food, entertainment and gourmet dinners. My FI and I love doing them because it's so easy and stress free (AND CHEAP). The excursions you do not have to book. Usually you can hop in a cab at the port and ask them to take you to the FREE beach. That's what we do! If you book early and then see the price go down you can call and they will give you the difference. Or call and say "I'm having a hard time deciding between you and your copetitor x. This is for our honeymoon is there any discount or upgrade you can offer us?"
Wedding bands...ebay, the large chain stores, craigslist, blue nile. You can get nice simple ones on the cheap.
The easiest and most cost effective way of cutting down is on the guests. The less people to cater for, hire chairs for, accomodate the cheaper the costs.
We opted for a weekday (friday) which is cheaper than on a weekend, and are having a later ceremony in the afternoon, again less time to cater for the guests, and at least before the wedding they would have already had breakfast and lunch, so only one buffet dinner is needed with some canapes when they get to the reception
Pay bar - sure it's ideal to pay for everyones drinks, but people can get out of control and drink more than if they had to pay. Make people purchase drinks at the bar if they want but supply a few bottles of table wine for speeches/toasting
And you may already know, but DIY is far cheaper than paying for a service, so more the better. :)
We did a 3:30 ceremony so we didn't have to do a meal.
We ordered cupcakes from Sam's Club as the grooms cake.
We only did "wearing" flowers, no flowers in the decor.
DIY centerpieces, backdrop, and favors.
You may or may not want to do this, but we had no alcohol, definite money saver.
Here are some pictures... hope they help!
No flowers, no cake, spent more for nicer venue which cut down the need for decorations, heavy appetizers and timing eliminated need for tables, chairs,centerpieces, etc. also, location let us bring alcohol which was a big savings. Cut guest list. Borrow, borrow, borrow.
While we are still planning this is what we are currently doing:
--Bought a used wedding dress, he's looking for a sale on his attire (shorts and a shirt, due to outside wedding).
--DIY flowers: for my bouquet, the girls are carrying kissing balls that I found online. We will only have one flower on each table
--Dinner from a catering at a local restaurat ($7/person). We found many afforable options, but we really love this place.
--table linens: we bought these online, they we cheaper than renting.
--getting married at a state park, and reception at a local Elks lodge. Look at local places like Elk's lodges, VFW's, community centers.
--no favors or gifts. I did "splurge" and buy my girls a green necklace braclet thing (could be either) because since I am asking them to wear it. And it doubles as a gift from my travels where I picked it up. We aren't gifting our parents or anyone else. It seems silly. They will apprciate a heartfelt card.
--photographer: we found a guy who takes amazing pictures but is just starting out. So we got a full day of coverage for $1000. I put out a Craigslist add and he had the best deal. I would suggest doing this- my friend did and got 18 quotes. I did it and got about 10 (she lives in Chicago, I live in small town FL).
--videographer: a local company that offered by the hour, so we only got our ceremony and a few hours of the reception
--no dj. We aren't having any dancing (he doesn't like it the spoilsport). So we will just be putting a mp3 player on low in the background.
Our was a little over $5000.
1. Biggest savings was the location. We did it at my childhood church (which is beautiful and recently renovated, but not a hot spot for weddings so it was less than $1000 for everything there.
2. We used a lot of "friendors". SIL made our cupcakes (she's a baker), friend of the family did our flowers (she's an amateur wedding planner), close friends did music and officiating in the ceremony, FIL drew our fingerprint tree, friends helped serve/organize/decorate, etc.
3. We used a very expensive pro-photographer's Second Shooter as our primary photographer so we got a great deal, with a young photographer who had worked extensively with a seasoned professional, and we got our pics edited by the seasoned pro! We also only had 4 hours of coverage rather than a whole day.
4. We did "hors d'oeurves" rather than a full sit down meal. The food was great and there was way more than enough (shrimp, pork sliders, turkey wraps, fruit cavered into crazy shapes (lol), chicken skewers w/ peanut sauce, a few other things I forget). Also, we never used the word 'wedding' with the caterer, just said it was an event at the church. Food was $10/head.
5. All the decor was DIY. Oriental trading company, random website for tablecloths, Chinese market for vases, etc. And we used our own books for centerpieces along with ribbon (bought at the chinese market), scrabble tiles, and flowers. We also borrowed some decor from a friend who had recently gotten married.
6. I designed my own invites! They turned out fantastic.
7. It actually turned out to be less than $5000 because I sold a lot of stuff after the fact. All my table cloths, my dress, paper cranes we used, on and on. I sold everything I could and got hundreds of dollars back.
-We did not do bouquets for the bridesmaids or flowers for the guys, grandparents etcand not ONE person even noticed...or they didn't say anything.
-We bought our own invitation kit from Wal-mart but made them look professional, saved us a ton!
-My SIL made our cake-free!
-We knew our caterer so got a deal..it's all in who you know
-We did not do favors for the guests, again no one said anything...
With that being said we had a beautiful wedding, it looked very classy but I'm a bargain hunter so everything was reasonably priced. Good luck to you!
We are cutting costs by having an OOT wedding (its only 2 hrs away but theres more competition in that area for weddings so prices are cheaper). The venue is all inclusive (inculdes decorations, centerpieces, tables, chairs, linens, food, dj) everything except minister, photographer, flowers, and cake at only 3K. We are DIY our flowers (its just for bouquets). We are either getting flowers in bulk at a Costco or Sams Club or farmers market. We were going to have a family member officiant our wedding (you can check it out) but I dont think anyone really wanted to (No men anyway) but when we booked our venue, the owner recommended someone for us (and it was only $150, much cheaper than the $250-400 quotes we were getting from others). I bought my dress off the rack ($489.27 to be exact taxes and price of the bag included). Im having some close relatives buy some things for me to have at the wedding like my veil, shoes, tiara, etc as gifts for the wedding instead of purchasing housewarming gifts we dont need (FI and I have been living together for 4 years now so we dont need anything). But I am coming with them to get the things (I can still be picky!). My cousin is purchasing my veil from valuveil.com (Im getting a 2 tier cathedral length veil for $15.99-- $24.99 with shipping included, and if you want a shorter veil, its going to be cheaper than that). I do also suggest shortening the guest list. We are only having about 50 guests. I dont know how much my cake baker is going to charge me for my cake but she's made cakes for me before and with her, it depends on how many guests are going to be there. I know a cake that feeds 30 is $100, and she gives a discount if you also order the groom's cake with her. I also know someone thats a really good photographer and she has a day job as well (she was my son's occupational therapist) so she's cheaper because photography is not her main source of income. Good luck to you and happy planning!!!
Yard sales/ Ebay/ Goodwill/ Salvation Army etc. my budget is 4,000 and those are HUGE helps! My beautiful shoulder length two tiered beaded headband veil was 25$ at a thrift store. It's amazing how much cheaper used wedding things are!
Our budget is right around $4,000.
Things we saved on:
FRIENDORS - huge $$$.
Photographer - free, I work for him as an assistant photographer. Extremely generous wedding gift to us. He's giving us the CD with rights and we are making all albums at cost (I do this for him in his office!!)
Cake - free. FI sister owned a bakery which she just recently closed, but she has offered to do a cake for us. Nothing extravagant.
DJ - $200. FI college friend does this on the side. He's a great guy and has his own equiptment.
Rentals - Free. I also work at a party rental store, and am getting flatware, stemware, dishes, tablecloths and chaircovers for free. Granted, I have to use things 1. they have in stock 2. that other brides haven't reserved on the same day. I will be putting on the chaircovers and tying sashes. We're setting everything up the day before.
Flowers - FI and I really wanted real flowers. We are getting a "wedding collection" from Sam's club for just under $300, which includes bouquet, bridesmaids, bouts, corsages etc. From Costco we are buying these "European Mini Bouquets" that come in a pack of 18 for $120. Since they are kind of sparse and we would like fuller centerpieces, we are also getting 100 white roses from Sam's at $80. I was originally going to do all the arranging the day before but FI convinced me that was too much stress. Plus, this way is basically the same, cost-wise. The downside is the "mini bouquets" are not color=coordinated, you just get whatever colors they give you. But, we figure with using the white roses and having neutral (gray) tablecloths, we should be fine.
Venue - $600 to rent a hall that seats about 175. It's recently renovated and very nice. Like a banquet hall without the caterer. We get it the full day before to set up, but must have everything down the night of my wedding. (There is another event the next day).
Honeymoon - We are driving to the Outer Banks (about a 12 hour drive from where we live) for three nights to stay at a beach-side hotel, $200 roughly for hotel and another $250 for gas.
My dress - I got a sample for about $600 which fit like a glove. I also bought a sash (which I wish I wouldn't have done now!!) for about another $100. I made my veil for about $3!
My accessories - I returned a few things at JCP I got for Christmas and used the $50 to buy a matching set of fake sapphire earrings and necklace.I also bought my wedding shoes at JCP for $30.
Groom's Tux - Because we have a larger wedding party, and the Dad's are getting tuxes, we are getting the groom's tux for free!
Minimal/DIY Alcohol: We don't have a ton of people who will be drinking at the wedding, so we plan on just buying a few cases of beer and a few bottles of wine.
Things we splurged on:
Caterer - This was technically not our splurge, since FI parents have generously agreed to pay for it. All said and done, $2500 for dinner buffet-style for 120 adults, 30 kids. We also are having app trays, and they are providing people to clear the tables after eating.
Hotel - $150 for the wedding night. This is a splurge for us because its the most I will have ever paid to stay at a hotel! It's a Hampton Inn though, and I wanted it to be nice for the getting ready photos.
Things we DIY'ed:
Favors - my aunt will be doing chocolate covered cake pops!
Invites/Paper Goods - I also dabble in graphic design and have an etsy shop, so I designed and printed all of our paper goods! Total cost about $50.
Makeup - I am going to do my own makeup. I do not wear it on a regular basis much more than mascara, so I am going to practice like crazy and do something I feel comfortable with. I am having someone do my hair though because it gets a little crazy and if I have a bad hair day on my wedding day I might freak out!
So things I had to cut - we originally wanted to have the ceremony outside the venue in a tent, but I would've had to pay at least $600 for that, plus what if it rained? The wedding is in May. Plus I would have needed more chairs. I didn't want to extra stress so we are just having it in a church.
Sorry if that was too much info!
Lots of ladies here have had gorgeous weddings on tiny budgets. Ours was 60 guests for around $5000:
Found dress on eBay for $50 shipped. Had friend's mom alter it for free. It was my friend's wedding gift. The craft store and especially the craft store with coupons was my best friend! Got my veil and such from there. Also got hoop skirt for $35 from eBay.
His tux was from Goodwill. My shoes were from Goodwill.
Our invitations were invitation kits from the craft store on clearance. I think it ended up being just $1.00/invite with postage! Ditto for the "thank you" cards. Oh, and we set up a web site to allow electronic (or telephonic) RSVP's to save more on postage.
We splurged on custom photo stamps for invites and "thank you" cards. Wanted to incorporate our pet into things since he couldn't be at the wedding.
Venue was a state park: $350 for a two-day rental of a beautiful stone cabin on a mountain top.
Food was a buffet and basically a pot luck. Booze was donated by a friend.
Officiant was a family member ordained through the Universal Life Church.
Music was iPod.
Photography was a family friend, though still costs hundreds.
Videography was a splurge, but we felt we had to do that as we have family abroad who couldn't be at the wedding-- so at least they got the video (and so did we!). Nothing fancy, ie HD etc. That cost around $1,000.
My mom made the cake. The cake stand was a multi-tier number bought with a coupon from a craft store that eliminated the need for her to construct the cake.
Flowers were minimal: bouquet, boutonniere and loose stems for centerpieces and cost < $500 total.
Centerpieces were DIY with Goodwill-bought mismatched teapots.
I also bought dollar store props for a photobooth set up with my laptop and a free photobooth program online. We gave electronic photobooth photos as favors.
Wedding bands were a matching milgrain platinum set on eBay for just $500 total.
Honeymoon was a local bed and breakfast trip for a week.
*Edit: don't forget Craigslist! We got a gorgeous silver punch set for the reception and gifted it to my now MIL. Also ended up selling a ton of things through Craigslist after the wedding to recoup some costs.
I loved our budget affair. We saw all the friends and family who've meant a lot to us over the years; but we didn't blow thousands of dollars needlessly on just one day. Think of where else all that money can go. For us, it'll be saving for a house someday!
@katycm: i love the sound of your wedding, especially the s'mores part. that is awesome and sounds so fun and different. wedding envy!! :)
@GoddessofNerdvana: my budget is $6000.00 things I am doing to reduce costs are ALOT of DIYing, check my DIY section for some pics.
I spent $100.00 on 4 packs of paper 3 shades of purple and 1 yellow. Thats 2000 sheets with this I am making, 500 kusudama flowers (centerpieces) 150 programs, 100 invitations and pocketfolds, 20 I spy cards, paper hearts garlands to string and hang for my decor. thats pretty cheap if you ask me =)<
We are also having a 7pm wedding so we will not have to serve dinner, instead we are doing a 10:00 snack bar that my family will help me prepare the days before. The wedding cake will be the only dessert.
Everything in 1 location so no rentals for chairs and Limo. I hired an up and coming photog...Only $500.00 for the whole day.
No open bar.. All drinks will be $3.00 each. The only people who drink for free are the wedding party.
Everything will stop at 1am so I dont have to pay the dj for over time.
We have a guest list of under 50 people.
That has honestly done the most for us - we're able to take everyone to a nice steak house and buy them dinner and drinks after a small church ceremony. No way could we host a full alchohol evening meal for 100+ people.
We did super lovely custom printed invitations - again, no way we could have afforded if we had to buy 80 or 100 of them. (We bought 30.)
Favors can be skipped entirely. We are giving what I think are awesome favors (50g of our favorite tea and a tea infuser with a charm as the part you hold onto outside of the teacup) but they make us happy.
We saved money by skipping save the dates, flowers, programs, most of the decorations, a fancy cake, and anything to do with an aisle. I picked up a pretty formal gown from Nordstroms (on sale for $80) and FI owns a tux already. We aren't having any attendants. Whenever I think about having some centerpiece that will have to be set up, cleaned up, and then dealt with after the wedding, I recall that I'd rather have my guests be able to see and interact with each other and that both teh church and the steak house are beautifully appointed already.
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My FI and I are on a tight budget, and won't be able to afford the full "Wedding of our Dreams". I'm bargain hunting, crafting and DIYing, and couponing like crazy, but I still feel like a lot will have to be cut.
So, to all you other brides on a budget, what was most important to you? What did you cut? What would you say was your WORST waste of money/time?