Help- Council Owned Wedding Venues

We are having our local guildhall and we negotiated with the chap who runs the venue. We have access the day before without having to officially pay for it, and we are staying later than the official hire time of 11pm by giving the caretaker on the night 'a little something!'

Bear in mind that if your wedding isnt this year (2012/13) the prices will change. We booked ours last summer for this September but because its the council they couldnt tell us the prices until this April. I budgetted an extra £100 for the day hire rate. This is when we found out that they are now doing it on a per hour basis and it would have cost us £400 more, we negotiated on this basis. I think it also helped that he knows and likes our caterer, and is quite a layed back chap - you may be lucky or not! It also isnt a popular wedding venue, not sure why I think its fab!

Thanks for the info!

I'm really hoping that they will be laid back and give a little bit extra, more flexibility. It's a lovely venue but it is in a park and so unfortunately there will be people around. I am hoping to have an afternoon ceremony and so fingers crossed the cafe will be near closing by the time we arrive at the venue. I guess the big negotiation point will be with the caterers, however, it would be so good to save that little extra with this also.

Hi, I work for a council.

We own a property which is used for wedding hire but managed externally, therefore they presumably negotiate on prices with couples.

We also have other properties that we own and manage ourselves, and are hired out for functions (although don't have wedding licences). These fees & charges are set at the beginning of each financial year and are formally agreed by the Council prior to implementation. Therefore we would not negotiate on these prices unless under special circumstances.

However, different councils may have different internal policies in place so the house can make devolved decisions about pricing. I agree that the public sector need to be more business-minded, and is certainly worth asking about.

Hi,

We've picked a council run venue and they have been fairly flexible...to a point! We were not able to haggle on price but because the caterer we will be using (provided by the venue - no choice there!) is external, we were able to save money on catering.

Don't know if i've been much help but basically try if you can but don't expect them to be as flexible as other venues!

x

We aren't using a council building but ours is run by a university and there was no negotiating with them as they set their prices for each year and that is what you have to pay.