Here's what my Mexico destination wedding cost

• cbgg
• 4 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

I know a lot of people considering a desitnation wedding are confused about what it will cost.  I just got back from my desination wedding in Mexico and thought I’d help out by telling you what I paid.  It’s hard to break down the cost by specific item because their systsem includes a package that you then add on to, so I’ll just give you the big numbers.  

My wedding was at a very nice all inclusive in Puerto Vallarta and we had 63 guests. And it was AWESOME.

$8000 for the ceremony & reception for 63 people included

 – everything that goes with the ceremony including some basic decor

 – served drinks during cocktail hour and dinner

 – appetizers during cocktail hour

 – A full dinner buffet including desert and a simple wedding cake

 – flowers (my boquet, one BM boquet, 3 bouts, centerpieces, ceremony flowers)

 – a guitarist during the ceremony, a mariachi band during cocktail hour, and a DJ after dinner

 – Bride’s hair & makeup

 – Wedding coordinator services (I’m in love with our coordinator)

 – Basic chairs, linnens, etc (did not choose any upgrades)

 – Very basic photography and videography.  

This was my origional bill, there may have been a few things we added in at the last minute that I haven’t seen on the bill yet.  All in all a fantastic value in my opinion.

What costs do you need to think about and budget for that aren’t included?  The following items will vary dramatically in cost based on your choices.

 – The cost of the trip for you & FI and any guests you may be helping with.  For reference, our trip cost about $1300 each, all inclusive.

 – Hair/make-up/mani-pedis for the ladies (at our resort hair was about $65 and makeup was about $60)

 – Your & his wedding clothes

 – Rings

 – Photography/videography upgrades.  We stuck with the resort’s basic videography but decided to hire our own photographer.  We found that if your looking for amazing work, you are going to pay the same as what you’d pay in the states/Canada.  

 – Favors (we spent about $200 on custom maracas for our favors, but also did a welcome gift that cost a total of about $170 and fan at the ceremony wwhich were an extra $60)

 – Paper goods (invitations, welcome packages, place cards, table numbers, etc)

 – Gifts 

 – Extra tips you may want to pay to vendors

Etc etc.  

Hope this helps! 

• cbgg
• 4 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

@mandika:  our wedding was at an all inclusive resort and all of the guests stayed at the resort.  Therefore, we didn’t pay for any extra parties, as it seemed unnecessary (although we would have been willing to and initially did look into it).  We did have extra activities and things like that, but non incurred an extra cost.

• cbgg
• 4 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

@M1cha3la:  Our wedding was at the Now Amber, it’s part of the big Dreams chain.  

Honestly, I thought it was going to be way more expensive at first, but then I cut out a bunch of decor type of items (things I figure guests don’t really care about).  I also bought a few things myself in mexico for WAY less than the resort was charging (fans, maracas, etc) and saved money that way.

• cbgg
• 4 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

@futuremrsk18:  everything I mentnioed at the bottom (my dress, grooms suit, the cost of actually staying at the resort for a week, rings, etc etc) are in ADDITION to the $8k.  I didn’t bother to include my budget for that because you can spend whatever you want on those things, regardless of having a destination wedding.  And some of those items (such as your dress and your rings) are WIDELY variable depending on your taste and priorities.  For example, you could easily find a casula dress for under $200 that woudl be destination wedding appropriate, but of course you could still wear a $5000 dream dress if you wanted.

This was an all inclusive resort, so the price that people paid to stay there includes roundtrip airfare, a week long stay, all meals, alcohol, entertainment etc.  People typically paid about $1250 per person, based on double occupancy.  This was within expectations for our guests, so it worked for us.  

Personally, my total wedding cost came to $21,000.  That includes everything – from details like the postage on the invatations and trips to Micahels to big ticket items like my husbands new suit, my engagement ring, our wedding rings, our trip to Mexico (which we counted as our honeymoon), the actual wedding…etc etc etc!

• cbgg
• 4 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

@nawella:  Great question!  I mulled this over a lot and I think i came up with a good solution!  Here is what I did

1) I did an escort card table instead of a seating chart.  This was useful for me because I did not know what the arrangement of tables would look like until after I got there!  This meant that I waited until I was in mexico to create the actual table assignments.

2) I pre-printed escort cards with the person’s name and a line the said Table ___.  Once I’d assigned the tables I went a head and filled in the number in the blank by hand.

2) Because the reception was on the beach which is a little windy and I didn’t want my place cards blowing off the escort card table, I create flat cards, then glued shells on them to weight them down.  The inspiration for the idea is from Martha Stewart.  Because I wanted to pack everythign flat in my suitcase I kept the shells and cards seperate, brought a glue gun, and recruited my mom and aunt to help me glue them the day before the wedding.  It was quick and easy.

Shell escort card inspriation:

http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/230944/creative-seating-cards-and-displays/@center/272429/diy-weddings#104424

And regarding it the suit case got lost – I’d have much bigger problems than missing placecards!  If they lose your suitcase they are likely to have it back to you in 24 hours.  I wasn’t even entertaining the idea that they might ACTUALLY lose my suitcase.  I didn’t worry about it.

• cbgg
• 4 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

@flowerring:  I had 63 people attend, but your RSVP rate will depend on a lot of factors.  I’d take these things into consideration when making your decision:

1) Who are your VIPs?  How do they feel about this idea?  Can they afford it?  Can they take the time off?  Are they excited about the idea, just tollerating it, or outright against it?  For me, if any of my VIPs weren’t on board we would not have gone ahead.  We chose the timing and guest budget for our wedding based on these people’s preferences.  What do I mean by VIPs?  I mean people who absolutelyl have to be there.  Make a list and talk to all of them before you book anything.  Everyone’s list of VIPs is differnt.  For my husband it was his mom, dad, and brother.  For me it was a group of almost 25 family members.  For you it might be your best friends.  

2) Are people in your group familar with the All Inclusive idea?  In general I find that Canadians are and Americans are not.  All Inclusive vacations are pretty much the standard for us Canadaians, but for my husbands American family it was a new concept.  If your guest list understands the concept and have experienced the exceptional quality and the great value, more of them will come than if it’s a foreign concept.

3) How much notice are you giving?  I did my destination wedding with only 4 months notice!  (Not ideal!)  Most people give about a year’s notice.  More than this is unnecessary for a Mexico destination wedding, unless you’ve got family coming from oveseas (maybe).  

4) Do the people on your guest list vacation a lot?  Is it likely that these people would be taking a tropical vacation anyway?  Are vacations something they prioritize?  If so, they are more likely to come.  

5) What are the financial means of your guests?  You probably have an idea of it they are struggling to get by or if they’ve got extra money for fun trips.  Most of our friends are 30 year old DINKs with solid professional jobs,and most of our family memebers are comfortable.  We also chose our resort primarily based on the deal we could get for our guests, not on the rates they were charging for the wedding.

6) Do your guests have access to time off?  We specifically booked our wedding to work with my dad’s work schedule and my cousins’ university schedule since they were VIPs.  Often people who are early in their careers (especially Americans) get very little vacation time and don’t really have any to spare.  However, people who are at a more advanced stage have often earned plenty of vacation adn are looking for fun ways to use it.  

7) Would your guests have to travel anyways?  My husbands family lives scattered all across the USA, so regardless of where we had the wedding they’d have to travel.  In this case it was a good value for them to travel to Mexico rather than to the city that we live in, which is quite expensive.  

You’ve probably got a good idea of the fiancial means and priorities of the people on your guest list.  Before deciding on a destination wedding (and after having a good talk with our VIPs) go though your entire guest list with your FI and put down your best guess as to wether each person on the guest list would come.  Then add it up, reduce it by 10-30%.  That’s probably the number of guests you’re looking at.  Is that what’s going to make your happy on your wedding day?  For us it was and we are so happy with our decision!  But the answer is different for every couple.  

• cbgg
• 2 years ago

• Wedding: April 2013

tina347:  I had no issues at all…because I didn’t change my name!  Ha ha.  

Are you getting LEGALLY married in Mexico?  If so, do you know what a huge headache that is?  I did not get legally married in Mexico (most people doing DW’s there don’t).  Just wanted to make sure you’re aware of this and have talked about it with your coordinator and made the appropriate arrangements.

If you are getting legally married back home  in CA before/after your trip to Mexico, you’ll only have the normal amount of headaches with the name change process.  Gotta love hanging out at the Social Security office :/