Florist - is this too cheeky?

As you're basically asking for one bouquet which isn't that costly I would give it a try. She can only say no. I negotiated with my florist due to budget. My bet is she will happily throw in a standard bouquet to get the job.

Ok, so next cheeky question... do you think I could get a couple? My MIL2B will be doing our cake... I'm getting her a gift anyway, but it would be nice to get her something to pass over during the speeches...?

Haha. Try "as you know it's all over my budget a bit, is there any chance you can incorporate two thank you bouquets in that price"

What's the worst that can happen. She either says yes, no or well I can do one and charge you x for the other.

Is there any chance of doubling stuff up to get it back within budget?

For example, my florist did 20 pew ends, we then bought 10 empty jugs, lifted the pew ends, placed them back to back in the jugs to make the table centres, which we then gave away the next day as Thankyou bouquets. 3 purposes, one set of flowers - helped massively for the budget!

If you gave her you original budget and now her costs have changed to accommodate your extra requests then I personally feel it's a bit much to ask for freebies on top. However, nobody was ever hurt by asking. Rather than asking for an out and out freebie, why not say that you need to go over options with her as you have a couple of extra requests and the budget is already tight?

I'm a big believer of 'If you don't ask, you don't get' - the worst anyone can say is no, and in business they expect people to try and haggle.

Go for it.

I am a massive believer in 'dont ask, dont get'...
I've had a deal with everyone for everything so far so go for it, whats the worst she can say? no....

I am trying to have a further deal with my venue about drink prices for the reception at the moment

Good luck and dont be afraid to ask. I am sure that every single bride has asked her for something at some point.

I'm waiting for my quote from the florist and will be negotiating there too ?

Sorrry just seen I pretty much said exactly the same as Soon-To-Be-Riley

That'll teach me for not reading the entire thread!! ?

Thank you all, it's good to see people not telling me this is a terrible idea anyway! I might see if I can think of an angle that'll help.

RE: doubling up, we are able to and will be transporting a lot of the arrangements. I might take another look at the lists and see if we can re-use pew ends for the top table as we're having arrangements in decorated jam jars. We're also putting mine and the BM's bouquets into bigger jars on the top table to add some volume.

Thanks again - wish me luck!

Good luck let us know how it goes. I asked. I got.

As we say up here in the north east 'shy bairns get nowt'. It's got to be worth a try. We managed to blag a free glass of wine to go with the meal, not bad considering we have 90 adults and they had already given us a 20% discount because OH mum works at the hotel.

I'm going to go against the grain here and say I think asking for one bouquet is fine but two is a bit much. I work in retail and people ask for loads all the time. I get that if you don't ask you don't get but to me people who do this sort of thing are cringe. Don't get me wrong, if you're ok with what people think of you then more power to you! (I'm the sort of person who doesn't ask and doesn't get, which believe me isn't better) I'm just worried that your florist would be less inclined to put as much effort into you flowers as she would into to bride who she thought was adorable and not asking her to take pay cut. But, obviously I have an unpopular opinion so don't listen to me, I just thought you should see another way it could be taken.

Thank you for your honesty - I'm not going to push... but thought it was worth seeing, as I've heard of brides getting stuff like this all the time. I also worked in retail for a long time, but that's what's made me a more savvy customer.

I'm also lucky that we seem to have built a good relationship so far, so I don't think that she will take it personally. I will probably meet up with her at some point or talk to her over the phone and see if we can make further cuts/adjustments.

The reason I ended up feeling more comfortable even entertaining the idea is because she agreed that she could work with my budget and went way over (this was, in part, due to me making some changes, but I didn't realise this would cause that much of an increase, which is something she should have been more aware of, in my opinion.)

So, yeah. I'm waiting on a reasponse, but this doesn't surprise me as she's been really busy for Christmas. Thank you again for all of your input