Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Wedding Tips: Cutting Costs Part 2

This is the last feature I have for the "Wedding Tips" series.  Please let me know if you have any other ideas or questions and I will be happy to answer them!

Below is the 2nd half of my cost cutting advice! You can read Part 1 HERE.

  1. I had a graphic designer friend design our Save the Dates + she was able to use her wholesale printing connections.  If you have friends in the industry, this is a great way to shave off costs and give them some publicity and a portfolio builder :) 
  2. No letterpress.  I am not a paper snob so I was okay going with printing on a thick card stock paper.  Although I love and appreciate weddings with the beautiful letterpress details, they often times go unnoticed and unappreciated.
  3. My wonderful mother learned the art of calligraphy years ago so she hand addressed all of our invitations. I was very lucky! This can be as much as $4 - $5 per envelope x # of guests = outrageous! If you don't have a friend that knows calligraphy, think about getting your envelopes printed in a pretty calligraphy font.  No one will know the difference and those literally go into the trash, they don't even make it on the fridge!
  4. I am designing my own wedding album using BLURB. I am a perfectionist so its taking awhile, but since I was given a DVD with all my images, our album is going to cost under $100 instead of thousands! 
  5. Look for local aspiring photographers to take engagement photos. I hit the jackpot with our engagements. Katie Norris was just starting her business and needed to shoot some clients before launching her website so she agreed to do ours for basically nothing with several different settings and outfit changes because she needed the practice and images for her site. Its a risk worth taking since the cost is minimal and there is time to re-do them if you are not satisfied.
  6. Being a member at the church saves you a ton of money when getting married in their chapel! So thank you David Evans for being a member at one of the most beautiful churches in town, Park Cities Baptist.
  7. We got married on a Friday instead of a Saturday. Its silly how much the prices drop. If you are REALLY on a budget, they drop even lower on Sunday but its harder to find churches that will hold weddings on Sundays.  If you are having a local wedding, the wedding party only has to take 1 day off of work which is the same amount of time you usually take off for an out of town wedding, plus in our case, it helped us avoid Halloween as our wedding anniversary :)
  8. DIY Wedding invitations.  Becky Wade was so helpful in getting ours printed at a discount and we went to Paper Source to get supplies to "fancy" them up.  We then had a glue stick party at my moms and my girlfriends helped us assemble, glue, and stuff them! I got SO many compliments on how they pulled together :)
  9. Grooms Cake.  Is it necessary? Some substitute this for pies or cookies which I think is a great idea! I have also heard of other people purchasing a sheet cake from Sams Club or a grocery store and then purchasing chocolate covered strawberries to put on top! Who would ever know the difference? :) We got such a good deal with our lady, we were able to afford both cakes for less than the price of one at the local bakery. 
  10. No videographer.  This in my opinion is a nice to have, not a must have. From what I was told, no one ever watches their video and as long as you have a beautiful photo album, you are golden. Instead, I had a friend videotape our ceremony and my stepbrother video our first dances, toast, and cake cutting.  It was all that I really needed and to be honest. we haven't watched it once! But its nice to know we have it, just in case we feel like reminiscing. 
PHEW! That was a lot to read ....but hopefully you found a few ways to help cut cost without sacrificing your dream wedding.  In my case, it was well worth it :)



 

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