Elopement budget

A destination elopement will defintely cost more. Our original plans were to elope. We looked into areas within a few hours of us and there were packages starting at $800 that included hotel, ceremony, dinner, flowers and a cake.

It sounds like what you are planning is a destination wedding and not an elopement. Elopements are typically simple, really small (just a handful of people if that) and no reception except treating that handful of guests to a meal.

I'm eloping to Nashville and so far:
Elopement package ( venue, cake, bouquet, and officiant) $995
photographer $450
dress $170
hair and makeup $300
Flight/ hotel: ~$1500
Marriage license: $90
rings $400

then the tux, tips and car rental will probably be another $1000

hope this helps!

View Quoted Comment Not really sure what you mean by "it sounds like a destination wedding". It is an elopement since it's just the two of us and maybe my parents. We will maybe cut the cake on a decorated picnic table and explore the park. I was inquiring about any bride elopement experience with a destination wedding and its cost and as well the average cost of a wedding because I wanted to compare.

View Quoted Comment Thanks a lot! I'm wondering why all photographer are over 1k. Maybe because it's a full day coverage. I'll continue "shopping". Thanks for sharing.

View Quoted Comment We plan to do it in Yosemite and everything is a bit pricey. However, I looked into east coast around New York and NJ and the nice venues were quite expensive.

View Quoted Comment Ours is only for 1.5 hours but definitely look into elopement packages!

Flowers and cake as well as chapel and officiant sound very high for an elopement. How many flowers do you need? The cake should only need to be one small layer cake, and therefore should cost less than $50.

Flowers and cake I haven't really looked yet. Only one vendor that was mentioned on the wedding blog so I'm not sure of the price but I assumed it would be expensive because of the delivery fee.

As for the chapel, we also found it expensive for the rental and think to book the officiant for outdoor wedding (Yosemite). But FH says even it's expensive that it's worth doing it at the chapel. Also, I'm planning from Dubai so it's not like I have a hometown in US where I know the venues, areas and vendors.

So we are eloping/small ceremony: 10 guests

What i will day is figure out what’s most important and do that. We chose photographer ($600), lunch for all ($300), first dance, elopement in Park with great views (don’t HAVE to get permit), and my dress ($550+alterations). I’ll get flowers and hair/make up done that day, but over all, we think for us to do all of this for under $2000 we are stoked with. We will have a nice dinner and hotel stay that night...

A Yosemite elopement sounds awesome!

I’m having a small destination wedding with an “elopement” package. 20ish guests...I’m easily going to spend north of $10k. But it doesn’t have to be that high. I’ve seen much less. I think when most people say elope—they’re thinking bare bones—it could be anything from going to the courthouse to something more elaborate. For a big wedding...there’s also a lot of variation. Geography, level of service, etc. I know I’d be looking at $20-$40k for 70 guests.

I think for flowers and cake—you could estimate more like up to $300. My florist is quoting $150 for a bouquet and you could get a small cake. It could be even less! If I were you and there was a huge delivery fee, I’d consider getting some kind of fresh floral alternative for the bouquet. What are you thinking for dinner? The park’s restaurants may be able to accommodate a cake?

We are doing a destination adventure elopement. We hired a wedding planner, photographer, videographer, the site will have lots of flowers, we will have a private dinner for two with a centerpiece and a first dance, cake and so on. We will be active for at least 8 hours but it wil just be the two of us. For what we are paying we could have probably had a wedding for 25-50 people but this is what we wanted. We are over $10k.

We will be getting married at Red Rock Canyon in Las Vegas. The package we are getting is $1,000 w/tax. It includes the officiant, 8” cake, toast, photography (75 pics), video, ceremony music, bouquet/ boutonnière, guide. For about $150 more I can add a limo for hotel pickup and drop off for me and my guests. We haven’t decided on what to do after the ceremony. Either a dinner at a nice restaurant or rent an air bnb and have them cater there.

View Quoted Comment Oh wow that sounds awesome and extremely reasonable! Congratulations!

View Quoted Comment Thank you so much for sharing and congrats! Sounds a lot like ours, we also want to do a first dance and will be active for a good part of the day. May I asked where you will have it?

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We were going to do it in Kauai, HI but ran into trouble finding the vendors that we wanted. Our planner and photography team is PNW based and they will present locations to us next week, so we haven't locked it down yet.

View Quoted Comment Hope you will be able to. Good luck!