Save Money: 7 REAL tips for saving on a wedding
This set of awesome tips, that can actually be used by anyone planning a wedding come from The Broke Ass Bride. Which should be called Kick ass bride 
Tip #1: Barter, trade, etc.
Don’t be scared to ask your vendors if they are willing to barter or trade their services. In this economy, people are willing to do a lot of creative bartering. In fact, I basically worked off my photography bill (a $2,000 value) by doing graphic design services for my photographer. And it’s even turned into a contract job for me now! Don’t worry if you’re not creative- I know photogs who have bartered photography services for carpentry work, home repairs, accounting help, etc. This could apply to other vendors as well. Never be scared to ask- you never know until you try!
Tip #2: Become a Google Ninja, Do your research
Don’t just buy the first thing you find online. Search many sites for what youre looking for. Read The Knot, Project Wedding and Weddingbee boards because lots of other readers will post discounts and special offers that they find and such. Also- I used Retail Me Not ALOT to find discounts for things I ordered online. I got some great deals by price comparing before a purchase. For instance, I found a ‘buy one, get one FREE’ deal on Amazon for some of the candy we purchased for our buffet. We ended up spending around $225 for everything for our candy buffet including the jars and we had 10 different types of candy! I recently also signed up for a site called Ebates which gives you cash back when you shop at many major retailers. Oh how I wish I had been using eBates when I was collecting my mason jars on Ebay!
Tip #3 Friend-ors
Don’t be scared to ask family and friends for help if you need it. A neighbor made our cake for free as a gift- it was a 3 tiered amaretto and chocolate cake with the most delicious buttercream frosting. Many of our
guests said it was one of the best they’d ever eaten! My uncle played guitar during the ceremony and performed a few songs during our reception. We also used a PA system borrowed from a friend and hooked it up to my laptop and ran a playlist from iTunes.
My friend/DOC put my flowers together for cost which saved us a lot of money. We spent $400 total on flowers- and that included all the flowers for the bridal party bouquets, boutonnieres, etc, as well as the centerpieces, some at the altar during the ceremony, the ones on the cake and candy buffet table, the flower girls petals and everything. TOTAL steal on the flowers. Look at how gorgeous they were:
Tip #4: Try a restaurant instead of a ‘caterer’
We used a local restaurant to cater our wedding. We fed 150 people a full meal for under $2700. That’s $18 per person WITH service, tax AND gratuity. They delivered the food, set it up in nice chaffing dishes, served and refilled as necessary, cleaned it up and broke it down for that price. We had grilled chicken and pulled pork barbecue, macaroni and cheese, loaded mashed potatoes, green bean almandine and baked beans. It also included a garden salad and rolls for everyone, as well as sweet and unsweet teas, AND 3 different desserts which we used in lieu of a groom’s cake. SERIOUSLY- we got a STEAL on the food.
Tip #5: Beer and Wine is FINE
We just had beer and wine at our reception (that’s all we were allowed to have at our venue) but I wouldnt have had it any other way. We spent around $500 for all our alcohol AND the bartender. We bought ‘Two Buck Chuck’ from Trader Joe’s and put our own labels on the bottles with our monogram on it. We also had a friend of ours buy canned beer from the Army PX- all their beer is discounted and has no tax on it- so we saved a bundle on alcohol. We had 3 different kinds of beer and 3 different kinds of wine, and had plenty of both left over, actually.
Tip #6: Thrift stores, eBay, and Craigslist are your new best friends
We got all of our jars, vases, and votives for our centerpieces from thrift stores or eBay. I paid 50 cents each for the 20 milk glass vases I bought from a thrift store, and around $2.50 each for the antique blue mason jars
on eBay- a splurge I deemed necessary to achieve my ‘look.’ Instead of going to a fabric store to buy burlap, or renting burlap tablecloths for an outrageous fee, I bought 2 bolts of it at the farmer’s Co-Op for about $40-
the price I would have paid to rent ONE tablecloth from the rental company. We cut the burlap to make the table runners and we were oh-so-pleased with the results!
Tip #7: If you can Do-It-Yourself, DO IT!!!
I spent alot of time and energy doing DIY projects that ended up saving us a ton. We made these tissue-paper-pomanders that have just taken over the wedding-diy circuit. It cost us around $5 per pom, and their simple style really made a big impact! Some other things I DIYed: Our invites, all signage, save-the-dates, eco-friendly cutlery wraps, wine bottle labels, etc. We bought some paper and used every last bit of it- none of it went to waste- the same paper for our invites and response cards also served as candy bar lablels, programs, cutlery wraps, reserved signs, and more. I was proud of that accomplishment- I designed everything to maximize the usage of the paper- we did all that for paper we paid around $120 for.
After the wedding, discussing the details of our final totals with my DOC, she was shocked at how little we spent. Not that $10k is a small amount of money, but we truly feel that our wedding looked like we spent alot more than that. And that was the whole point- was to show that you don’t have to priceless to me- but for the sake of our future, I’m definitely glad that we pulled it off for less.
So don’t worry if you’re a broke-ass– just get creative- you CAN have the wedding of your dreams on a budget!
