Food Expenses

View Quoted Comment Hi could you explain what that is?

$500 is really inexpensive! Can you get family and friends to make side dishes? Or move your wedding to brunch time and do a light brunch?

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It is pretty much a table with snack foods and deserts. (fruits, crackers, cheese, cupcakes, ect) Everything is kind of scattered and we will be adding some flowers to decorate. And for dinks, we are having a large metal tub full of ice with some glass bottled sodas and waters. Our wedding is in a nice location and 100 people. This really cut down cost and will be sure to have something that everyone will love.

Your wedding is from 3-8pm and you're not providing dinner?

I love idea

Its just too expensive. I rather do finger foods

View Quoted Comment I love the idea

We are paying over $1000 for 55 people and we are apparently in one of the cheaper states so anything under that would be an amazing deal! What are you planning on serving that you expected it to cost less than $500 for 60 people?

If the start time can't be bumped up, you have a decision to make. 3-8 definitely is dinner time. You provide a full meal or have grouchy hungry guests who will leave early. If I attended a wedding where there wasn't food/drinks at the reception, I'd probably leave after the ceremony. Not saying this to be mean or hurtful, but 5 hours is a long time to go without a substantial meal...especially if there is dancing!

I would agree with doing a cocktail hour. We have 50 and are ending up spending $1500 after food, staff, and plates/cutlery. The cheapest we even found was still about $900. I’ve heard of people doing something like a potluck so if you really want to do a meal that could be an option as well.

View Quoted Comment I originally wanted to do a potluck but I was convinced otherwise; unless you have a way to keep the food hot during the ceremony and don't mind people potentially coming in casual clothes since they'll have spent their morning cooking. I'm going the finger food route myself.

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What time will it be when it ends?

Never mind, I see that you're planning 3 pm to 8 pm. That's over dinner time so you need to serve a meal or change your plans. If you can't afford to serve a meal, end your reception at 5 or 5:30. Then you can have a 'cake and punch' reception with just beverages, snacks, and cake because it's not over a meal time.

View Quoted Comment Times 2pm until 7pm

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That's still over a meal time. You need to end before 6 if you want to not serve a meal.

$500 is definitely an amazing deal. If you are having your reception into the evening like 7-8 like I’ve seen, you definitely need to provide a full meal. Maybe cut it a bit shorter like 2-5 and just have cake and appetizers. But if a full meal is not provided within that time frame, people will most likely leave early

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Okay, 2-7 pm or 3-8 pm either way is 100% over a meal time and you have to serve dinner. I know what you mean about "finger foods", but if you wanted to serve just appetizers, it'd likely come out way more expensive that just serving dinner. You'd have to provide a substantial amount of appetizers—enough to make up a meal. If people are dancing and drinking (making an assumption here, but that's usually what people do during a four hour reception), you need to feed them properly.

Your options are pretty much:

1. Cut your guest list so you can afford to properly feed all of your guests over your desired wedding time. As PP have said, $8 pp is an amazing deal for feeding people. Have you looked at "untraditional" places such as taco shops, Italian restaurants, BBQ places?

2. Make your wedding much shorter, not at a meal time and serve snacks or cake and punch—say, 2 pm ceremony and cake and punch 2:30 pm - 4 pm.

3. Elope and have a vow renewal reception when you can afford the type of celebration you want. Or just elope!

I’d personally go for a shorter event if I didn’t want to/couldn’t afford a full meal — “cake and punch” style, with some snacks (maybe something like that grazing table idea with meats , cheeses, veggies, fruits, crackers etc maybe dips like hummus or something ), drinks, and desserts (maybe cake, or maybe cupcakes or something easy and able to be hand-held). Could do something like 2-5pm for this whole event, so it’s over before dinner time and then people can go off and have their meal — as long as it’s over by 6, it won’t disrupt anyone’s dinner. If you have people scheduled for a longer period of time, they’ll need more food available.

If you don't want to spend $500 for 50 people you should just go to the courthouse and have a renewal later on. $500 is a lot of money for certain things, but it's not a lot of money to feed 50 people. What's your budget and where were you planning on having the wedding/reception. Do you already have a venue? Were you gonna have it at the church?

It sounds like you really just don't want the expense, if those were my options I'd go on vacation with my man and not worry about anyone else. If you have the money to go on vacation and don't want to use it towards your wedding then just don't have one, get married at the court, go on vacay and have fun, no stress about wedding stuff. Even if you do a vow renewal a year later to have a reception the cost will come up there so maybe its something you just don't want and thats totally fine too!

Is it possible for you to have your wedding reception at a non-meal time? This way you can have a simple cake and punch reception with several veggie/fruit/cheese trays. That's what I'm doing to save some money!