How much are you spending?

Really? Im finding ebay a godsend with so long before my wedding- Ive got enough time to really sniff out the bargains!

Atm it's looking at 6k, but that depends on what package we decide to go for with the venue:

Ceremony / reception venue hire: £$4000 approx

DDAttire- bride, groom, bridal party: 1000 approx

Tog, DDJDJdj, MUUUUua- 600 approx

Misc stuff- artificial flowers, craft stuff for invites, stuff bought on ebay etc- 400 approx.

Really? Im finding ebay a godsend with so long before my wedding- Ive got enough time to really sniff out the bargains!

Atm it's looking at 6k, but that depends on what package we decide to go for with the venue:

Ceremony / reception venue hire: £$4000 approx

DDAttire- bride, groom, bridal party: 1000 approx

Tog, DDJDJdj, MUUUUua- 600 approx

Misc stuff- artificial flowers, craft stuff for invites, stuff bought on ebay etc- 400 approx.

Venue £11K

Dress £1k

Accessories approx £500

Flowers £700

BM dresses £360

DJ £250 (mates rates)

Photographer including photobooth £500 (mates rates)

Invitations £150

Finishing touches including favours £150-200

Suits £300

Rings approx £600

Thank you's.....£???

I'm sure I'll think of more things to spend money I haven't really got on... the list could go on and on

I have worked really hard to keep costs low (bargain hunting, making a lot of things myself). We are coming in at just over £5000, we could have had afforded a £20,000 wedding but there was no way I'd spend all our savings on one day! We're having a small wedding and have only invited the close family that we really wanted there.

The biggest costs were

Venue - (train, boat, catering) around £2500

Tog - £800

This is a really useful post. There are so many things I havnt thought of, quite important things aswell! Doh!

I'm not 100% sure yet. Originally I wanted to do it for £5k but I suspect it'll be more like £10-12k not including honeymoon.

We originally wanted to keep costs low, but all in excluding honeymoon we've spent 11-12k

WOW our total spend with 6 days to go is £3200 and £1900 of that has been payed for us, my grandma bought the dress, FIL payed for the tog, my dad the catering and mum the venues. Even on such a teenie tiny budget I don't feel like we've made any grand sacrifices, it's a small and very homemade wedding and I truthfully don't feel like we've missed out or scrimped anywhere.

I think our wedding is coming in at about £13k.

£7800 - it would be £10,000 for venue which includes food (3 course meal) for 80 people, ceremony room, chair covers covers, evening, canapes, welcome drinks, wine with meal, coffee after dinner - and accommodation in about 25 rooms. The guests are paying towards their own rooms at £100 per room, or £40pp for single people who are sharing family suites. No-one seems to mind this, and it was totally optional. It includes breakfast the next day. So this brings our venue to about £7800.

Dress - over budget on this, it will come to about £900.

Flowers - not sure, only want a couple of bouquets, have budgeted £200.

Registrar fees - £390 +£70 for giving notice

Invitations cost - £70

Disco - £300

Suits - not sure £300-£400 budgeted for groom and bm

Bridemaids - £300 for 2 bms

Photographer - £500

Favours - already paid £214. I think it will be about the same again - £400.

Centrepieces, order of day, menus and place cards - budgeted £300 for all. Mum is growing pots of herbs for centrepieces.

Cake - making own. Think this will cost £100 for tins, euipment and ingredients

Wedding rings - £400 for both

Honeymoon - £400 for cottage for the week in Peak District near our venue. It means we can have it for the night before the wedding as well, so that saves us having to find a hotel.

Ok so, rough figures...

church -£500

reception venue - £11500

Band - £1300

tog - £1700

vog -£1000

my dress and accessories - £2900

bm's and boys - £900

flowers -£900

honeymoon -£7500

I don't think budgets matter, you'll have a lovely day whatever you spend!

We were originally hoping for 6k but its coming in at about 8k. Plus 6k for honeymoon. I can't believe some of the over 20k weddings but then if we had that kind of money I can't say we wouldn't spend it. I guess location makes a difference too. I hope you all have fantastic days reguardless of the money spent!

I find the idea of spending thousands on a single day obscene too, but I had a party at home for my 40th which cost a couple of thousand by the time I'd added in all the extras that one doesn't usually think about, so I figure our wedding is more important. We're avoiding the wedding machine as much as possible but there is no escaping that the day we want, and particularly the time/venue we want, is going to be inescapable.

The venue/registrar is coming in at just under 4K, and on top of this we are having the food catered, with a couple of bands and a DJ. The day itself will need no friends and family input to make it run. But we (I) will be doing a lot myself in advance. We'll be inviting 120 with the expectation that maybe 100 will come, and are on track to bring the day in for approx 8K, with a 2K contingency.

Really interesting to see how much everyone is spending! We have splurged on a few things, bands, vintage bus and I really want a chocolate fountain, but making some savings in a few areas, so in my eyes it kinds evens out lol!!

We are getting married in a town hall, which allows for us to provide our own drinks, so instead of paying to expensive arrival drinks at our reception venue we were thinking of getting a few cases of champagne for the town hall, this means people would get a few glasses of champagne compared to one glass of bucks and extra money will pay for canopies. However the town hall isn't catered so I will be relying on my bridesmaids to pour the wine for us...is that cheeky? This is their only really job for the day, with exception to putting out a few pots of sweets at beginning of evening reception. That's not too cheeky is it?

xxx

We're spending loads. But, it's within our means, and even though we were given about 10k, we looked at it as a gift, and didn't really do any moret han we could have done without it.

A breakdown of the major costs:

Venue/food/drink (including meal, receptions drinks, extra 10 bottles prosecco, evening buffet, and account bar): £16,944.60

Accommodation (7 nights stay in the castle's holiday rental Medley Court pre-wedding): £2250.00

Registrar: £680.00

TOG/VOG together: £1250.00

Dress: £750.00

All the rest: (DJ, stationery, gifts, rings, cake buffet, pageboy/flowergirl outfits, men's suit rentals, hair/make up, instax camera film, guest book, mirror for table plan, my sandals, tea cups, candles, flowers, creche): ~£3000.00

Grand total: £24,872.60

I know it may seem OTT, but we wanted to have an account bar for guests, we wanted to offer the better quality options for food/drink, we wanted to have the castle, we wanted the week in Medley Court (which is AMAZEBALLS, and I have family staying there in the week before the wedding as well)... There are a lot of things we could have spent even more on, but we picked the things that really mattered to us and we spent our money on getting the best we could get with what we have. I've been to weddings that cost far more and far less than ours, and they've all been great.

Our breakdown was roughly:

Dress, suit, shoes etc etc (both our outfits) £2000

Ceremony & 3 night stay at wedding venue, inc champers and wedding breakfast for the 2 of us £2000

Photos £1500

Rings £2000

UK reception inc venue hire, ceilidh band, hog roast for 60, canapes, cake, champagne, decorations, hair and makeup £4500

All other travel, (hitched award winning?) honeymoon, flights to destination approx. £9000

No Beth that's not cheeky. We had OH's brothers and their wives serving champagne and canapes at our reception, and my mother in law was in charge of portioning up the cake. Everyone mucked in and it worked fine.

Not OTT at all. The average wedding price is around £24,000 from what I've read, and as I believe Funky pointed out once on a similar discussion, the average cost of a wedding on Hitched is perhaps much less, as lots of brides come on here for help, advice, general support with DIY elements of their wedding etc, so the Hitched budget is probably less than the national wedding average.

Plus, if you are in SE England as well.

It's all relative. Some people do it on £3k, so a £10k budget to them seems extraordinarily high. To others, a £3k budget is extraordinarily low. There will always be people who have done it for less, and people who have done it for more.

We were lucky enough to have the dream wedding we wanted, and quality and quantity of food and drink, and fab venue were probably the most important "materialistic" aspects of it. I know "materialistic" is probably not the most appropriate word, but didn't want anybody accusing me of putting food before vows.... although on second thoughts, I do love my food.

I know exactly what you mean!

I'm looking forward to the celebratory aspects of the days far more than the ceremony itself and vows. That's what the rest of our lives are about. To me the actually day/wedding is about having an awesome party, with great food, drink, and lots of laughter and dancing!

Agree 100%

Beth, I don't think it's cheeky at all. They might really enjoy working the room and chatting to everyone anyway!

Is it bad I don't really know how much we ended up spending? I think it was around £25k, with another £4k for honeymoon. Our venue was the biggest expense and probably worked out around £15k once we tweaked the package so we had what we wanted (as a warning, a 'bargain' pacakge can quickly add up once you start adding extra people and and choosing different wine/food from the basic menu!). We also had dinner at the venue the night before for the family and an open bar in the evening which dad insisted on (and paid for), which ended up being a fair bit. Then we spent a bit more than planned on a band, who were worth every penny in the end. And my shoes were Jimmy Choos.

But we also had a Marks and Spencers cake, and borrowed a car from a friend and just used a standard pre-booked taxi for the bridal party. I think it's about working out what is most important to both of you, and what you can do without/scale back on.

From past weddings we've been to, it's the couple, the atmosphere and the guests who make the wedding what it is, not how much was spent.

I totally agree with this statement. If your wedding reflects you as a couple then regardless of the budget people are going to love it.

I don't think it matters what others are spending as its all relative. We're spending about £8000 max for a gorgeous 5 day stay and wedding in Italy. We could easily spend ALOT more as we both earn decent amounts. We're currently saving £1500 per month but this is to move to a bigger house. That is far more important to us at the moment. I can't pretend that it doesn't make me gasp when I see some amounts that people spend but that's because I think what we can do with the money and not any judgement on anyone else.

The most important part, in my opinion, is that the wedding is fully paid for before the wedding, ie don't get into debt! I think it's madness to pay for a wedding on credit. So whether that is a 2k wedding or a 20k wedding is largely irrelevant.

Ours is working at about 5k but have budgeted for 6k should anything untoward happen. We have 100 day guests and probably about 150 evening.

I think it does not matter too much what you spend as everyone is different. I know people who have done their whole day on 2k others who have taken a loan out for 15k. We want to pay for as much as we can without the use of credit cards. We have a mortgage and stuff on finance so are trying to do as much as we can ourselves as we want to start trying for a little un as soon as married. So don't want an arrival and trying to pay the wedding off on one wage. Our honeymoon we are hoping will pretty much be covered by people contributing to it anyway so hopefully not too much of that to pay off.

I don't envy those paying 15k+ its up to you to how much you want to make of your big day

We are doing a wedding for 26 (28 if you include 6-month-old twins as guests, which the hotel doesn't) including airfare for our American guests, accomodation for everyone the night of, a reception for 120 and a second reception for 300 for under £6k. There will be open bars at both receptions, the balance of which will be paid afterwards, but that's my father-in-law's doing and thus I refuse to count it.

Our "guideline figure" given to us by my father-in-law was $20k (£13k, roughly), but we had no interest in spending that much on anything.

Our methods of saving money have been buying off-the-rack non-bridal dresses in ivory/champagne shades for roughly £120 each, we've got a pastry chef acquaintance of my family doing our wedding cake for the cost of the ingredients, we'll make our own bouquets from fresh flowers bought at the flower market the day before the wedding, my partner's graphic designer friend is designing our invitations, and so they'll only cost paper and printing, and we've opted to have only immediate family and best friends at the actual wedding. I didn't particularly want the receptions, but the families are insisting, so it's rather a must. We'd have done it all for under £3k otherwise.

We had no interest in a traditional do, and have opted to get married out-of-season and on a Thursday, which chopped costs even more. The Saturday night receptions are actually the bulk of our budget, but we've been able to get a couple of fun extras for those (photobooth, candy buffet, candyfloss & popcorn machine, a great DJ and a fantastic band, between the two) without guilt because we've been so frugal elsewhere.

We live in London so l totally know what you mean! When we initially got engaged we viewed a few venues and some crazy prices were mentioned. We are now getting married in Vegas and having a wedding party when we get back. We are hoping to pay less than £10k for everything -wedding, honeymoon, wedding party etc.

We have been to lots of different kinds of weddings -budgets, locations, styles etc they have all been great and amazing days.

Wow, I had a right result.

Venue - 60 day guests with 20 bottles wine, 3 course meal, welcome drinks, toasting fizz, bridal suite, DJ, evening buffet for 90 - £2300

Registrar & Notices - £320

Suits - £210 for 3 suits

Bridesmaids dress (1) - nothing, wife of best man "gifted" it but accessories - £50

Hotel room for best man and his family - £200

Cake - nothing, it was gifted

Cars - nothing, my mate cleaned her black Qashqai and donned it in ribbons

Photographer - nothing, best man's daughter did them (they were FAB)

Videographer - nothing, our friend did it

My dress & accessories - around £180

favours - £20

flowers - my one big extravagant spend - £400

hair and make up - nothing, sister is hair dresser / beautician (but I did spend £60 on nails, tan, eyelashes)

bits and pieces for decoration - I'd say about £60

TOTAL - £3800

And as mum and dad paid for the venue, I think our total spend was about £1500. Our "honeymoon" is a weekend in a caravan down in cornwall, courtesy of Sun Newspapers.

?

Venue £5500ish including 53 guests for 3 course meal, 3 drinks and wine we are providing, chair covers, DJ, centrepieces, garden games

Registrar: £374

Photographer £595 not including album

Flowers: £400ish (4 buttonholes, 3 bouquets, 2 free standing arrangements all roses)

Cake: Not sure but I am estimating £200 for a 3 tier multiple flavoured

Dress: £800

Favours: £50

Accessories: £150

Stationery: £300 including seating plan, table names, card box

BM's: £400ish including flower girl, page boy and presents

Suits: £400

Honeymoon: £7000

Beauty Treatments (Waxing, Massage) £217

Hair and Makeup x 3 £415

Rings: £487

Cattery is included £300ish

Total amount is basically £18,000

This is the person who was convinced she could do the wedding and honeymoon all in for 10K...actually if you take away 5000 it isnt far off, it is the honeymoon that has pushed up the budget so dramatically..

If I had more money I would upgrade to a choice meal with one of them being lamb, that is an extra £10 per head so looking at around £500 just for the food. Had I not been on a budget as such I may not of made my invites, table plan so there is another expense. I would probably have exclusive use of the venue so that in itself would cost a fortune.

At the end of the day we all work to our own budgets and finances and we do the best we can for what we can afford.

Had a sneaky peek at your venue and it is lovely!!!!

It really is ❤️ It cost us a pretty penny, though!

Our venue is taking the biggest amount of the budget, but it includes full board accommodation for 70 guests for 3 nights, if we asked people to contribute for their rooms, we'd be able to save about 10k

Venue - 17K (including 4 course meal, canapes, all drinks and late buffet)

Bride (dress, shoes etc) - £2,500

Groom - £1500

Bridesmaids - £800

Groomsmen/Ushers - £500

Tog - £1500

DJ - £200

Organist - £50

Cake - £200

Florist - £800

OH wants fireworks and that is my surprise for him - £500

No honeymoon budget yet, FPIL's are paying and OH hasn't chosen yet and we've set aside around 5K to do the English reception. Very fortunate that my parents are paying for the wedding. I wouldn't have spent that amount of money but my parents fell in love with the venue and are happier spending 25K+ on a whole weekend for our guests, than the one day. We will be contributing and paying for the English ceremony. Interestingly, some venues in London that we saw quoted nearly this amount for around 8 hours.

We aimed for £9k but at the moment its coming in closer to £12k but we expect it to be closer to £15k by the time we are finished... As for the honeymoon we have not budgeted for that...