Wedding expense

Im in St Louis, mo, and ours is topping out around 5300.

Not sure how you feel about weekday weddings, but typically weddings on a Thursday or Friday is much cheaper at any venue than it is on a Saturday.

View Quoted Comment Def Looking into it. Thanks!

Also certain months of the year will be cheaper

It’s mostly relevant to the style and location of your wedding. For example I live in a small town in northern ca and am having a casual rustic wedding and I’m spending a little under 8k. The biggest thing that will lower cost is cutting your guest list.

I live in Nashville, the cost of living is sky rocketing here. We had our wedding for just under $13k it can be done.
*We got married off season which can save
*We got married 45 min from the city *Minimal floral half of which I bought from the grocery store I* bought decor from Burlington Coat, Ross, Marshall’s, dollar tree, clearance racks. *Got alterations from an independent seamstress who works out of her home. *Bridal shows. Our venue got our email because we went to a show. We missed their booth some how. They sent out a folllow up email and I was in love before we even visited. And the price was great. *Find a venue where you can bring in your own licensed vendors. We did this and were able to DIY our bar/alcohol and saved big time. Many preferred vendors have high minimums/are expensive. *Only buy what you need/want don’t worry about all the things Pinterest says you need. *use friendors with caution. But, look at what your friends/acquaintances do as hobbies. We saved money by going with a friend or for our cake, day of coordinator, and DJ. We also kind of used a friendor for our bartender. That didn’t save money or work out well 🤷‍♀️Don’t stress and don’t be afraid to think outside the box 😊

My daughter's wedding is the Bay Area and we were able to keep it at $15,000 (including venue, caterer, flowers, dessert, photography, dress, and plane tickets to Kauai for honeymoon). It is a Saturday, BUT it is a brunch reception which makes all the difference. The venue was $3000 (historical site owned by regional park system), $6,000 caterer (including rentals: China, glass, silverware), $2000 photography/videography, $2000 flowers (1/2 vendor and 1/2 Fifty Flowers), and $2,000 open bar (beer, wine, champagne/mimosas).

Half of these numbers are driven by regional variances. We got married in NYC, and the average wedding *supposedly* costs north of $70k. We spent less than half that, because that's well more than our yearly earnings.

You can always save money in a lot of creative ways - sample sales for dresses, fake flowers, cutting out the "trendy" things, getting rec's from friends (can get discounts), film students for videographers, etc.

But at a certain point, those of us in big cities are going to spend more, just because space costs more.

View Quoted Comment Holy crap! 70k!? I’m not even worried about the little expenses, photographer, dress, dj and such. 25-35k is just for food/drinks/venue. I don’t live in downtown LA. I live near the Long beach and Palos Verdes area. Either way, it’s crazy seeing the variations in price. It will definitely take some work on my end to figure this all out. Thanks!

View Quoted Comment That’s great for the Bay Area!

We did! About $15K for our DW and $15K for our local reception. But our DW has only 15 guests, local reception 50 guests.


For 100 guests, you’ll like need to consider a brunch wedding or Sun-Thur night if you want a nice venue.

I totally feel you on that. In CT our wedding is costing us more than $35k. I'm sure you can have one way cheaper here but if you want it all you have to pay premium for it lol plus I don't want to DIY anything (no time).

I would also suggest searching venues other than very popular or traditional venues. My location didn't have many reviews and doesn't seem to be as well known as the venues around here that run 20k. Are there parks where you could do a tent and DIY, smaller hotels or B&B's, large AirBnBs (that allow celebrations) and could have outside catering? Pushing to the outskirts (as far as you can with family with limited mobility) and looking at weekdays definitely helps (or even a Sunday brunch style).

I was in a wedding a few years ago in San Diego, they paid 20k total. Cash bar, no champagne toast or tableside wine. No cocktail hour (we took pictures before). All inclusive venue. No paid transportation. No videographer. No favors. No save the dates or engagement photos. $5 gifts for wedding party. Buffet dinner. They got married on a Thursday. I was also in a wedding in Orange County that was about $3,000. They got married in a public park by their local pastor. A friend from church was the photographer. No favors, no save the dates, no engagement pictures. Invites from walmart. A local seamstress made the wedding gowns. No gifts for the wedding party. Her mom DIYed all the food. The reception was in a local gym. No alcohol. Cupcakes from a local grocery store.

I live in MN we are looking to keep the wedding under 10k, our venue is 1200 - food will be about 3k, then the photography will be about 3k. Photography may be cheaper if I can have a friend do it. We only have about 50 guests and are probably wiling to not go above 60, that helped keep the cost low for us.

It depends on your venue and what you are allowed to DIY versus they are required to do for you. A friend of mine did simple wine bottles decorated with baby’s breath for her centerpieces plus bouquets for the girls - $1000 total for her flowers. Another friend of mine purchased individual flowers but did her own arrangements and this saved her a lot of money. If you have to do a linen rental I’ve found it’s much cheaper to buy them (to donate later) than to rent them. Our venue has dark chairs so I purchased some white chair covers to slip on them - the purchase was less than $200 whereas renting would have been $850! That being said, our wedding is not only $15k lol but it’s doable depending on your location and guest list.

Are you considering only an evening reception? Wedding brunches and afternoon teas are a great way to have a less expensive reception, but I suppose it depends, to a certain degree, on your demographic. Our guests were largely in the 50-70 age range, 75 total guests. We also had champagne (no open bar or spirits) and music was provided by a string quartet. Budget photographer, no video (which I wish I had done, btw), an Adriana Pappel dress, one attendant, low key flowers, $5,000. We live in Washington DC.

They're definitely NOT in LA, We cut costs when we could, but we still spent $65,547.93 for a guest list of 300 (286 showed up). However, if you want to cut your cost, having it outside LA in San Gabriel Valley.

I live in rural NC. Venue is a county owned park, no alcohol, friends and family are providing finger foods and a non traditional cake. I’ve only hired a photographer. We’re DIYing basically everything else. My budget is $4,000 and so far I’m staying close.

Our venue in upstate NY has a $27k minimum for food and drink on Saturdays, but no minimum on Sundays, so that saved us a bunch. Have you looked into places that aren't actually venues? Such as renting an AirBnB and using friends/family to decorate and bringing in individual vendors for the day-of services?