Destination Wedding Challenges

Totally agree with you on it having challenges. I struggled with that early on but my FH said that if they don’t book ahead, it’s there fault if it costs more. Our latest issue is that we are less than 60 days out and people who sent yes rsvp’s back haven’t booked plane tickets or hotels. I am a huge planner so I’m not sure how to proceed and I could be over stressing.

You are not over stressing. 60 days away, I would reach out to see if they plan to attend. I’m going to give guest deadlines, that way I have some type of control. I am 14 months away and freaking out. Only bc the closer we get to the date, the more expensive it will be. The price of my resort went up by $200. I am hoping it goes back down, however like your FH said “it’s their fault”. Don’t feel discouraged by this. You gave them an ample amount of time to plan for this. It will work itself out and who needs to be there will be there. I wish you the very best.

I also did a destination wedding and it was way more stress than a local wedding would have been but it was worth it in the end. Working with vendors I didn’t know, trying to get everything I needed to the resort, the amount that guests had to pay for that weekend, and on and on BUT it was gorgeous and my guests said it was the best wedding ever. Enjoy the planning as much as you can but remember to take time for yourself along the way. Good luck.

I’m having a destination wedding as well at the Sheraton in Key West. I have a block of rooms reserved through them, and they do not require any kind of deposit until three days beforehand. They also allow for any changes to the reservation, including cancellations, without any fees. So far it’s been quite easy. They have a block of ten rooms saved for my wedding, and will add onto that as needed without any charge to me. I am also not accountable for any rooms in the block not used if people choose to stay elsewhere. I know different hotels have different rules about room blocks, but I would verify with them what you would be responsible for if not everyone comes. Only reserve the absolute minimum number of rooms that you know will be used, as most places will allow you to add on. I do have to say that $200 does not seem like an unreasonable cost to reserve a room for a weekend. Most places would require that anyway, wedding or not, and that money should be deducted from the final cost so I’m not sure why anyone would not go for that reason.

View Quoted Comment Hello Jeanie, thank you for your input. That’s why I’m losing my mind over here because $200 is very reasonable. I will reach out to my resort again to see if we can work something out. This should be the last thing that I should have to worry about. It seems like you’ve been working with a great team of people. I wish you all the best. Your team is so accommodating.

View Quoted Comment Thank you Cyndy. I will follow your advice. It does seem stressful but the end results will be worth every minute of it.

I hear you! Our destination wedding was a four hour drive for us. This limited our communication with vendors to strictly e-mail and phone for most of the planning process. I found an on-location hair and make-up team and had to travel for my trials. (I ended up having to do this twice.) Our photographer was local to that area and we needed to be there for our engagement shoot. We also needed to go up for our tastings. We booked with the florist without any consultation meeting - truly sight unseen. We really tried to limit the number of trips by combining multiple vendor appointments in one go.

I'm doing a destination wedding in Jamaica in November. I found a travel agent to manage all of that and instead of a block of rooms, she just worked out a group discount so that I wouldnt be stuck. She keeps me updated on status of guests and she does some of the nagging for me. She gave me the best advice early on- she said that my resort (and others) do so many weddings all year round that they are like robots and that they dont do much until a couple of months before the wedding. She said some brides can get frustrated and anxious but just trust that it will all pull together well in the end. That helped me a lot because you have to wait for responses and it's hard to visualize and plan without a lot of info. My rsvp deadline just passed and basically I'm counting those who have booked. There are a couple of people for whom we would accommodate if they decided last minute to come. I think destination weddings pretty much guarantee your headcount since they have paid out the money already.

DW wedding 9months away and I’m having a hard time deciding if to get a room block at all. Both quotes I’ve gotten from the hotel are $30 and $60 more than their currently advertised rate (per nt) so I’m just not understanding the benefits. I get that in the long run those who procrastinate will be the ones to book my block, but what if they decide to book somewhere more affordable in general and then I’m on the hook for X amount of rooms? This whole hotel situation is what stoped me for holding my wedding at a resort—I didn’t want to have to tell people where to stay/how much to spend. I’m leaning towards not getting a room block at all, but I’m torn.

View Quoted Comment Good morning Vanessa, that’s my concern as well. My destination wedding planner told me to opt out of that option bc I will be responsible for the rooms that don’t get filled.

I’m so stressed that at this point I feel like renting a beach house instead and having my wedding there.

My resort isn’t being as accommodating as I would like for them to be. I feel like they should offer some type of discount for weddings . I’m bringing thousands of dollars to their resort and I am getting no incentives in return.

View Quoted Comment Good morning Heather. Your planner is awesome. I’m going to reach out to mine to see if she can work something out w my venue. At this point, if they are not willing to offer any discounts or incentives I will change venues. My date is 10/10/2020 so I have time. I would hate to do that, but I am willing to.

View Quoted Comment It’s very frustrating!! I just reached out to a TA as well about what Heather said, discount with no room block.

Hey! I’m surprised your resort didn’t work something out with you to give you a flat rate. I agree with you 100% about giving an incentive! Maybe see if they can give you and your fiancé free nights since so many guests will be booking rooms. I’m getting married in Puerto Rico in February, our hotel charges 1 night as a deposit and the rest upon arrival. The price is the same no matter when someone books. For yours, you cannot control the prices, you’ve already told people when to book so it’s their responsibility. I’m feeling the same way about flights, the prices keep fluctuating and there’s only 1 flight going to where out wedding is. It’s extremely stressful however I have to tell myself it’s out of my control, I gave all of my guests the info and there’s nothing else I can do. I wish I could add an additional flight in the afternoon rather than just a red eye flight!

Our biggest concern now is decor. Our hotel doesn’t provide any decorations. We’re going back at the end of the month to see if we can buy decor there rather than flying it from NY. Fingers crossed! I booked a photographer, videographer and DJ but having a hard time with hair and makeup especially bc everyone speaks Spanish! I need my fiancé for all my phone calls.

I hope your resort can do more for you! Don’t freak out because you have over a year also. People have time to book. I should probably be freaking out since ours is a little more than 6 months away! 😳 Hope all of your other planning is going smoothly!

We are going to Secrets Wild Orchid in Jamaica. The wedding packages are reasonable but the extras can add up. I used a travel agent and she set up the discounts through apple vacations I believe but she used different airlines depending on the quote at the time the guest booked. It wasnt a huge discount. However, I believe with AMresorts or at least secret, the 5th room is free. The coordinators dont deal with the reservations part at all which is why we had the travel agent work on our behalf. Good luck

View Quoted Comment I’m new to the forum! I just got engaged literally 4 days ago. We too are considering the wedding date of 10-10-20! I’m thinking of a destination wedding in possibly Jamaica or Aruba. I don’t even know where to start. I thank this forum for helping me generate ideas and plan. Best wishes to you!

We're doing our DW in Mexico in March 2021. Our travel agent did require $2500 from us for the block of rooms, but when our guests book, it'll comes back to us. Basically it's what we'd pay for our suite so we're ok with paying that up front ( one less thing to take care of) plus she was able to negotiate incentives we get every 6th room free and depending on how many rooms book we get somewhere between $750 and $2000 as a credit toward our reception. Wedding was included as well. She's also handling all the bookings and our guest can lock in their rooms for only $50 pp. While I know some don't like to book a block of rooms typically so long as you release them back to the hotel by a certain date you're not liable for any additional costs. It made sense for us. Now we're just struggling to figured out whether to bring decor or rent from the resort. Good Luck to you!