Photography Negotiations

We didn't negotiate anything.

I wouldn't say daughter "negotiated," but there were definitely some vendors who she talked with up front about her budget and asked what, if anything, they could provide that fit within it. She used that strategy with her florist and videographer (maybe others) and both came up with proposals that would work for her. There were others who just told her straight up, "no," which was fine. It didn't hurt to ask.

We didn't negotiate, but we did book our photographer and videographer (both are through the same company) during a really good sale they were having! We got around $1,000 off and a free photobooth upgrade. It never hurts to check and see what photographers are able to give you within your budget. Also, some photographers have discounts on here if you say you found them through Wedding Wire. Also, check photographers' FB pages to see if they are having any specials!

We didn’t negotiate in a “can you give me the same product for less money?” But we did adjust some things to fit in the budget. Like “oh this quote is more than we can spend, let’s remove one of these appetizers and see what that does for us” or “this rental quote is way high do you have a cheaper chair?” ...for our photographer to save some money we opted for less time & didn’t have her stay through the reception like she would with a full day package.

I negotiated with our DJ. We didn’t want a photo booth or some of the lighting so I negotiated for more time instead.

I agree with the previous posters! We also did a little bit of light negotiating...if we really wanted to work with a particular vendor but they were a bit higher than another vendor’s quote, we asked them if they could match the amount quoted by the other vendor without naming the other vendor of course (and a lot of times the difference was a small percentage of the overall quote). Sometimes we asked to take out some unnecessary stuff (engagement session since we already have pro photos, extra hours, photo booth, etc). I hope that helps!!

Not necessarily negotiate. We had uplighting on our DJ contract but it was a range and never a true total amount was listed. We ended up asking to take them off cuz our venue had a ceiling light structure. They were fine with it. Aside from negotiating flowers, sizing, and taking out floral items, I didn't truly haggle for prices. The floral quote was always a work in progress up until she needed to order everything.

I only tried negotiating with the church venue and the reception venue. Not successful at all AHAH.

View Quoted Comment This is what a i did too. I think is a little rude to try to change the prices just because but you can tell them your budget and make something that could work for you

We didn't really negotiate but our photographer offered to put together a custom package for us after we talked a bit and discussed our needs. So I would say if there's a photographer you like but their packages aren't really what you're looking for it's worth asking if they can put together a custom package rather asking them to lower the price of an existing one.

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We negotiated a bit with our photographer/DJ team. Similar to the above quote, we found a cheaper team with the same products but we preferred the team we went with. I let them know that we really liked them but that we did find a cheaper competitor. They weren't able to negotiate the photo/DJ pricing due to all the labor involved, but they did offer discounts on some extras we were looking at (ceremony video and photo booth) which are less labor intensive. Overall, we got the team we liked with all the options we hoped to afford for what we'd planned to pay if we added similar options with the cheaper vendor, so I think it worked out well!