Budget

Nearly everything!

...But we got married in NYC.

To be specific, flowers, cake, and the limo.

We actually found a venue/caterer for a LOT less than we expected, and I found my dress at a sample sale, so we could splurge a little more on photography.

I GET why flowers and cake are so expensive, but, oof, add in higher city costs and you could have a heart attack.

Catering really gave me sticker-shock, and was instrumental in my decision to have a smaller wedding (luckily I could use Covid as an excuse as to why it needed to be small). My first draft of the guest list was a ridiculous 248 people, my final list is 100 TOTAL people, including me and my fiance. I actually get really excited when someone tells me they can't make it, that's one less meal to pay for.

Food/people from restaurants to serve it and photography ... sticker shock, an old friend of mine is a professional photographer for weddings... 1. He was unavailable for my date, (i wanted him and his wife only) but 2. his associate was just as expensive!!!! Over $4,000 !!!!
I decided to go with another friend just starting out officially(getting paid As job) but has been taking pictures for YEARS... she is charging $800-$1,000... MUCH better pricing .. considering we only need someone for 4 hrs, no engagement pics

View Quoted Comment This. We literally had to up our budget from what we initially anticipated ($15k to ultimately $23k) because everything was way more expensive than I imagined.

Flowers!! And photography/videography!


Weddings are a sticker shock in general but the floors got me and I was ready to cut them out all together but compromised and made it work for us.

Flowers not floors*

The officiant is what surprised me! In my area $500-$800 is typical. I was expecting maybe $300. Oops!

Definitely photography/videography!

LOL all of it!!!

Flowers are what really floored me the most though!

Catering! We thought it would be around $7k-$8k, but in our area the average is closer to $14k.

Officiant are the only thing the really shock me. Just to gauge how much to budget (we love envelope budgeting) for them we’ve been looking and cannot even fathom spending between $400-$800 for one! Our budget is set at around $20,000-$22,000 not including my dress just because we knew venue and catering would be expensive but we didn’t think an officiant would be half a thousand dollars. I’ve been married once before and had a family friend do it- my divorce was pretty ugly and I would never have a family friend marry me again. So I’m absolutely willing to pay for an officiant but money has to be moved from other areas of the budget for it lol.

1. cake

2. photography

GOD i thought cake price by the slice was RIDICULOUS- luckily i found a bakery for cheaper

and photography blew out of the water. i had no idea it was going to cost that much! in hindsight i see why though because that's what you have left after the wedding and they have to do all the work to edit hundreds of photos after. but i guess going into my planning i had no idea it was literally thousands of dollars for photography

VENUES.

I understand some that include rentals like tables and chairs and also include staff...

But there are places in my area that are literally just buildings with utilities and indoor plumbing, no staffing services or rentals included, and they want $8k-10k to rent for 8 hours.

Having worked in the industry before, I'm not generally surprised by the prices for anything that involves someone's talent or skill (photography, videography, music, flowers, catering, baking, etc.) but for an empty building... crazy.

Definitely venues and catering! We postponed and also changed venues - we went with our first venue because it didn't have a fee, just a F&B minimum (restaurant venue). I knew catering would be the biggest cost, but FH was astounded how expensive it was!

Also knew flowers would be expensive too, but even more than I anticipated. DIYing our centerpieces because of this cost.

DJ and photographer. We found really good ones and we knew it would be costly (after all, if you hire professionals you should be ready for their prices!) but my family was surprised about the cost. But it's a one package deal, we'll be getting photos, videos, smartshow 3d video with the best pictures, all the culling done for us, etc. I personally find it reasonable.

All of it!
Venues - shopping made me cry.
Photography (forget videography).Officiant. We didn’t have flowers but I’m sure that would have been sticker shock too.

All of it for sure!!

I live in NY and everything is expensive and I know venues/vendors upcharge for weddings.

The catering definitely gave me the biggest sticker shock so far. Mainly because it was one of the first quotes we had gotten and included all the alcohol, which is obviously going to be expensive. After that I became way more realistic about prices.

Photographers, DJs and flowers can all get pricy too if you go with top of the line and want it all. However, so far my experience is that it is possible to find good options within budget.

Make-up services were high to me. bc of it, I'm going make-up free on the big day.

The officiant got me as well. I'm paying $600. Everything else i planned pretty accordingly for

Originally my husband and I had a number in mind for cost and within one day of researching realized we were going to have to double it, so that was a shock.

The four things that got me the most were venue rental, catering, tips, and taxes.

The cost for literally borrowing space for 6 hours with nothing else included was so much higher than I imagined.

Catering was more than I expected as well because I was figuring it would cost a similar amount to when my husband and I go out for dinner, times the number of couples we were inviting but it actually ended up being quite a bit more.

Then taxes. I live in a state that has no sales tax and no income tax so I'm used to not factoring in taxes to much, so didn't expect to pay so much in taxes for services.

And tips. The cost for all wedding services is so expensive I didn't realize there was so much tipping on top of it. Taxes and tipping alone will easily be a couple thousand dollars of fees we didn't anticipate.