How much does/did your destination wedding really cost you?

View Quoted Comment Hey ! Check in with Beach Reunion. That is who we rented our house with. We rented the house Venetian Palace. It was perfect. We used Catering by Bob out of Panama City Beach Florida. They stated they generally did not deliver to that area but, we got married on a Tuesday , they did not have anything else going on and made an exception.

View Quoted Comment Where did you have your wedding and how did you book it? Did the 4K include hotel rooms for guests?

View Quoted Comment Hey Jamie I really love your response. I’m in the early stages of planning do you think I can pick your brain ? My Instagram is linda_in_keto_life.

We had our reception at a well-known hotel in Puerto Rico. Our space had a Food&Bev minimum of $16,000. MOST venues have this, which we did NOT know at first. So as you're looking, definitely ask what is the venue's F&B minimum (this is the minimum amount you have to spend. We were under budget and had to add things like food stations to reach that $16k).

Our vendors were all local (DJ, MC, Bongo Player, Decor, Hair/MUA, and Photo/Video), flights, hotel, welcome bags, welcome drinks, tips, etc. probably brought the total costs to $25,000+ for everything. It was more cost effective because only 50 guests came. I recently got a JetBlue credit card, that came with 40,000 points, so we used that for our flights. The hotel gave us a discount and 1 night free on our suite.

It was absolutely worth it to us because it was a once-in-a-liftetime vacation with 50 of our loved ones. What's cheaper for you depends on where you live and if it's cheaper to fly to one of those places you mentioned. Hawai'i is one of the most EXPENSIVE states in the USA, so I highly doubt it's going to be within the budget. We had some relatives who didn't have a passport, that's why we chose PR. But otherwise we would've went somewhere cheaper like Jamaica.

Note: We had a local ceremony, and other Indian cultural events, so the $25K is only what we spent on our reception.

View Quoted Comment @Brooke, it sounds like you got an amazing deal. I am currently looking at possibly having my wedding at The Moon Palace in Ocho Rios, Jamaica. I spoke with one of the wedding planners there and I was overwhelmed to the point where I’m thinking about getting a wedding planner. Did you have a wedding planner or are you doing all of the planning/coordinating ? I’m working with a budget of 10K for the wedding including travel if possible. Were you able to get a group discount rate for the hotel? The wedding coordinator I spoke to said they do not offer discounts but they will lock in the rate at the time the contract is submitted so if the rate goes up after my guest won’t be affected by it. Any insight you can give would be great. Thank you

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@Quanza, yes I feel we got a great deal! We ended up spending around 10k total (not including our travel) but a lot of that was unnecessary and it can be done beautifully for much less. for example, my husband insisted on a band instead of a DJ and paid the difference in price which was close to $2,000. He also asked his parents to host a plated rehearsal/welcome dinner which was an additional $1,500. That would have saved $3,500 alone on just those two big costs. The band was good and the dinner was amazing but I personally would have been happy with a DJ for less money and the buffet rehearsal dinner which was FREE. We didn't feel we had to cut corners at all to get the wedding we wanted so basically without those two costs it would have been around $6,500 for an amazing weekend!

We ended up with 63 people total so the high number of room nights helped us to get the basics all covered. Saturday night we had the rehearsal dinner on a beautiful outdoor patio area. It was very secluded from other areas so there was no noise from hotel guests. They staff the wedding events SO well and there was always one person who was tasked with keeping the bride and grooms drinks full the staff was so polite, helpful and amazing. As I said, we did do a plated dinner and had to pay the difference in cost over a buffet but the buffet would definitely have been just as lovely. The basic table/chair setup with white linen, full bar and buffet meal are free with the "room nights" count of free event hours. We paid for the plated meal but that was it! It could have been completely free! We felt their centerpieces and some add ons were too pricey so I brought my own centerpieces and my mom, aunt and friend went over 30 minutes early to put them out. We didn't use a sound system because we felt we could talk among a group that small. Several made speeches and we had no problem hearing everyone.

On Sunday, wedding day, we had a one hour cocktail reception with standing cocktail tables with white linens, passed appetizers and a full open bar for one full hour before the ceremony (completely free). This was in the garden right next to the ceremony location so guests didn't have to walk far to be seated. Our wedding coordinator kept up with time and guided everyone over. The ceremony set up is again, free, but we paid for extra chairs (it included 30 and we had 30 guests) and also paid for extra champagne for a toast at the end. We had a free boutonniere and bouquet but we also paid to upgrade those. For the chairs, champagne and boutonniere/bouquet, the ceremony cost $400. If I was doing it again, I would have skipped the extra flowers because the basic white roses would have been fine!

We took photos after the ceremony and then guests walked 2-3 minutes down the resort to the reception location. Again, the basic table/chair setup, open bar and buffet meal were free. You choose from several menus and the food was great! We paid for extra decorations and the band. We upgraded the cake to feed everyone and a pretty cake stand ($210). We also paid for white paper lanterns with lights to be strung over head, two large letters for our first names with the & symbol (B&L) to be set up.. these were like 3 feet tall and a great addition to the decor, and a light up sign that said "bar" to put in the bar area. Those three items were $1000. As I said earlier, my husband wanted a band and it was $3,100 but we could have had a DJ for around $**** that would have been better in my opinion.

The only other cost was photography. The resort packages were pricey in my opinion so I chose to pay the resort the $1000 external vendor fee and hired my own. I ended up paying around $2500 total for the photographer plus the vendor fee and got a lot more than I would have for the $3000 photographer from the resort. FYI I also priced external bands and DJs but there wasnt much cost saving with the external vendor fees.

Additionally, our travel was around $4,500 for two first class flights and 7 nights at the resort. Again, you can save with coach flights here. We used a travel agent to handle the bookings for our group and she managed the room count with the resort so I didn't have to handle any of the stress of that. I highly recommend using someone like that! We used Dana Abate. Her email is tripsbydana (at) gmail (dot) com if you want to reach out to her.

If we had flown coach, used a DJ over a band, and gone with the buffet rehearsal dinner, we would have comfortably been below 10k for everything including our own travel and it was seriously a fabulous trip and event! I am happy to answer further questions. Please just let me know!

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Hi Channele,

Just curious what hotel you booked at? I am looking into a DW in Aruba with a similar budget and number of guests.

Thanks,
Rachel

We are having a destination wedding in Turks & Caicos and my quote for reception food for 50 was $6k. That doesn't include bar or anything else.

Hi. We are having a DW to Mexico next month. Our original package was $3500 for 25 people. We did a lot of upgrades (flowers, photography, chairs/tables, and an extra party on friday night) and our total is now $10k. Travel for the week was around $2k plus flights.

We invited 22 people and 16 are coming. Our package included the ceremony, cocktail hour, and dinner. Basic chairs/tables, flowers/centerpieces, food and booze.

From NY, we had a local ceremony in NJ (because we're Hindu and our ceremonies are very detailed and require a ton of sacred items).

We had our reception in San Juan, PR - 50 Guests. The venue was $16,000 food & beverage minimum. With the decor, DJ, hair/mua, photo/video, flights/hotels, welcome bags - we spent about $25,000.

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Super off topic but that Linda profile pic omg !

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Where did you do your destination wedding?

View Quoted Comment We got married in Montego Bay Jamaica