Money saving tips

Flowers and cars are massive expenses that we cut. For cake we are going to buy some jazzie cakes from Asda, 12 quid each so getting 2! Doing your and Bridesmaid hair and make up yourself is also a big saving and getting a friend to do photos if you know someone with a good camera. I would say it is awesome you want to provide free bar but no one expects that and in honesty if you are in a commercial venue this could run in to the thousands so I would really think hard about it and if you really want to scrimp on other things that you may regret afterwards. If you are doing DIY and can provide your own alcohol look at doing a run to France and go to a car four or warehouse as is way cheaper to buy in bulk then here even with the ferry costs. Good luck in whatever you decide x

Oh and invites, have you created a website on here? We have and will be sending e-vies with the Web address and people RSVP online. You need to add your guests in to the site which takes time but so worth it to then be able to do table plans etc

I’m going shop bought for cake. Getting fruit cake and cupcakes so people have a choice. Asda do trays of cupcakes at reasonable prices as do Lidl and Aldi. Not sure about other place but worth looking into. Also we are not having flowers. Take a look at IKEA for your candle holders I managed to get some that cost 30p each and then we have battery operated candles as there are too many children for real ones. I’ve shopped sales for as much as I could.

Thank you ☺️☺️ Great ideas so I will have a look into them all! X

We have gone for no favours, DJ just in the evening (I have a playlist for background music during the day), bridal party are not wearing matching suits so can choose whatever they want to wear, 1 bridesmaid, taxis rather than wedding cars, friend making our cake, artificial flowers - no florist!, DIY invitations…


The list is endless haha! We couldn’t afford a free bar but instead we have a small token on each place setting for 1 drink on us… alongside the cocktail hour and wine on the tables at dinner we thought this was enough

To add to the list - either ditch the bridesmaids/groomsmen or tell them to wear whatever they want. A lot of supermarkets do plain iced fruitcakes which will be cheaper than anything you could make yourself - get a custom cake topper to dress it up if you're not confident to decorate it yourself - it will still be cheaper than a professionally made cake. Get your regular hairdresser to do your hair (or DIY if you're confident) rather than have a 'wedding hairstylist' do it (my hairdresser charged me £10 for a simple bun, while the 'wedding stylists' were all charging around £90 for a mandatory 'trial' and hair on the day). DIY the reception flowers using flowers from friends & family gardens (it helps if you go for an informal 'country garden' look as you don't have to make them perfect, and if you use something like jam jars, you don't have to buy vases either) and get a supermarket bouquet if you're not confident DIYing one.

Get friends to drive you instead of booking a wedding car. Put together your own playlist instead of having a DJ. You also might find getting a high street wedding dress cheaper than buying second hand - I looked for second hand and they were mostly more expensive (e.g. original price £1,000 reduced to £300), so it worked out cheaper for me to buy a cheap new dress instead.

Have you booked a venue yet? Might be cheaper to go down the village hall/local caterer route than using a 'wedding venue'. Or book a function room in a nice pub - many of them will just charge for the meals instead of charging for room hire as well.

View quoted message Can I ask where you got your e-bites I’m super keen at saving money and time with invites

View quoted message We are simply sending emails to our guests inviting them and pointing them to our hitched website so they can RSVP on there and we will have a page with all the info about timings, venues, hotels nearby and directions etc

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You could check out Canva - it's a website that enables you to design posters, invites, fliers etc for free (they do have a pay-for bit, but I've always found plenty of choice among the free stuff). You can upload your own images into their templates too. Then you just have to email the completed invite out to people.

We used Canva for invites too. It was really easy. You can either email them to people or just post them 2nd class. It doesn't cost much.

Agree with the person that recommended a village all or similar. We found barely any venues that would let you supply your own alcohol and have opted for a marquee in a field instead. (Still isn't particularly cheap!!) but does mean a free bar is wayyyyyyy cheaper than paying for eveyones drinks at a proper venue bar.

We bought digital invites from esty. We got a bundle that includes evites, table numbers, menus, welcome sign, timeline of the day and photobooth frame etc that suit our theme. We plan to send out evites to most guests with a link to the wedding website, but print some off for our older relatives. We also then have all our wedding signs in the same design as the invites that we can customise and print out ourselves.

We're also saving by not having transport, doing cupcakes, doing our own flowers, make up, and renting suits instead of buying.

We have a drink after the ceremony, wine and prosecco at the meal, which I think is pretty standard. I don't think a free bar is expected at all.

We are having a free bar in the evening but limiting it to wine, beer, cider and single house spirts only. A friend had drinks tokens as favours which worked pretty well.

Do you have a friend who's a good baker? Wedding cakes are so pricey. We were really happy with our cake, it looked gorgeous but it was so expensive and people didnt really eat all that much of it. You could also consider doing something like a tall stack of brownies instead.


Favours are also nice but not essential - some of our guests left them behind on the table - not everyone wants to take stuff away with them especially if they only have small handbags, so great idea to save money by not bothering with those.

I'm going to the local salon for my hair done. Still havent got over its only going to be £22, cheaper than a cut! Doing my own make up. Went to a posh airport transfer car service rather than wedding car. We kept bridal party small.

View quoted message Can you put your menu choices on your hitched website? The canva site that was suggested to me is AMAZING

View quoted message This is amazing thank you so much - saved so much because of this useful info 🤩

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You can amend them on the RSVP list I think but not actually done it yet as not got our final menu choices from our venue yet

If you’re looking at a free bar options, there are ways to keep it cheaper. Does your venue allow you to buy your own alcohol and just pay corkage costs? Alternatively, you could do a ticketing system? For our cake, we’re just going to buy two small nice looking cakes from somewhere like M&S, for £40-50 and stack them on top of each other. You could do your own music too? Most venues have a good sound system, that you can use something like Spotify or Apple Music or plug into. You could try and save on a photographer too, by approaching local art colleges or universities. A lot of photography students will charge way less that a photographer, as they are keen to build a portfolio. I have bought my bridesmaids dresses from ASOS, and I’m telling them to wear whatever shoes and accessories they want. Groom and groomsmen are hiring suits, instead of buying, and we’re hiring false flowers.

We saved on a wedding photographer by finding a photographer that did other things like animal portraits as well as weddings. We also found a company that supplied modern cars like Mercedes E Class rather than traditional wedding cars. Because they use the cars for other things as well we paid less than a third for 3 cars than we were quoted for two traditional cars.

Use a steamer on the day for last minute crease removal and freshening up of the wedding dress and suits. Propress claim to be experts in bridal wear.

The best saving tip is to spend less than you earn and try to save at least 10% of your monthly income and invest it in, say, stock market.

Fake flowers - go to ikea or the range and make your own buttonholes/bouquets.
Hobbycraft sales, Etsy, Freecycle, charity shops - will help you find things to decorate venue for cheap, and also you can get some stuff to make guest book etc.
With secondhand wedding dress - be careful what you pick as you could find you don't end up saving money if it needs lots of alterations. You'll also like need to clean the dress and that is costly too.
Have lots of cupcakes to go with a plain cake to 'cut' instead of a tiered cake. Tell them its for a birthday or anniversary.
When looking for venues say its for a party. Don't mention the word 'wedding'. It's amazing how much cheaper the quotes are.
If you are planning a free bar, I'd say get a venue where you provide your own catering. Then you can get drink wholesale. Friends of mine in the past have even created a wedding website where guests helped 'sponsor' their wedding by buying like 'x bottle of wine' 'x bottles of beer' as wedding gifts to the couple.

A word of caution about not mentioning that its a wedding. Yes it may well add to the price because In almost every aspect of what is normal for anything non wedding then for a wedding it needs to be notched up to the next level which - yes adds cost. Ultimately if things go wrong you may not have any redress as you cannot say that they ruined your wedding because you did not let them know it was a wedding.

Booking a wedding supplier is partly based on trust, trust that they will turn up on time or at all, trust that they will do a good job ect but by not telling them its a wedding then you are not giving them the opportunity to go that extra mile that weddings deserve.

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I guess the thing to do is to decide how 'ruined' your wedding will be if the supplier backs out?

I'm afraid I disagree that most suppliers need to have their service 'notched up to the next level' for a wedding (although I agree photography is one of the few exceptions). In general, it's just an excuse for overcharging - I had a verbal quote to deliver a plain iced fruit cake to my house on a set day. When I received the email confirmation, the price had doubled, and when I questioned it, I was told "oh, we forget it was for a wedding." So the identical cake, delivered to exactly the same location on the same date becomes magically twice as expensive when it's for a wedding. Same thing with hair. Quotes for £15-£20 for a simple updo for a wedding. You're the bride? Oh, that will be £50 with a mandatory £40 hair trial beforehand. For exactly the same style.

It's the same with catering - umpteen times, we were told that the eyewatering increases in price for a wedding were due to the need for 'exceptional service'. I worked in a restaurant in the past, and our manager insisted we gave 'exceptional service' to everyone who walked through the door. She'd give us a rocket any time she thought we were not giving 100% effort, so there's no way we could have improved our service levels for a wedding!

Just to second that recommendation for M&S cake. You can order two-tier cakes (£45) on the website and decorate yourself, which we did with some flowers. Our wedding was last week and we were pleased with the cake, it looked like a traditional wedding cake and tasted great too. Saved a fortune! We also bought flowers direct from wholesalers and only spent £300 and had enough flowers for 14 vase centrepieces, one long and low top table arrangement, 10 button holes and 4 bouquets. No one in our family are florists, but they looked lovely.