Planning a Wedding Budget

Planning a wedding budget is very important, especially if you are spending someone else’s money (your parents, or possibly your fiance’s parents). Here is a basic list of what you should put in your budget and the average percentages of what brides spend in each area of their wedding. Bear in mind that these percentages can change and are only meant to serve as a basic starting point for you.

To figure out your amounts, just take your total wedding budget and multiply it by the percentage listed below. Example: if you’re wedding budget is $20,000, using the percentage for Reception Locations show below, ($20,000 x 9% (or 0.09)) your budget for your wedding reception site would be $1,800.

• Ceremony Fee - 2.5%
• Ceremony Decorations - 1.5%
• Reception Location - 9%
• Reception Decorations - 4.5%
• Food and Service - 33.5%
• Beverages and Bartender - 9%
• Cake and Cutting Fee - 3%
• Wedding Gown - 6.5%
• Veil and/or Headpiece - 1%
• Bridal Accessories - 1%
• Hair and Make-up - 0.5%
• Massage, waxing, facial, etc. - 0.5%
• Bouquets/Boutonnieres - 2%
• Band/DJ/Orchestra - 6.5%
• Photographer - 6.5%
• Videographer - 5.5%
• Invitations - 4%
• Car/Limo Rental - 1.5%
• Wedding Favors 1.5%

Obviously, everyone will have personal preferences as to what they want to spend on different things. You’ll need to go through your wedding budget after you have calculated the amounts and figure out if you think any are too high, or too low. You can then spend accordingly!