Wedding Planning Blog

Destination Weddings seems to be a topic on everyone’s minds. We at Just Marry! have seen a big increase in destination weddings here in Orlando and outbound as well.

A college student writing an article for Boston University just contacted me to ask me questions about the pros and cons of planning a destination wedding. As soon as the article comes out, I will link to it. Anyway, one of her questions was, is a destination wedding less or more expensive than a traditional wedding.

That is an interesting question!

My associate Aimee Bressler handles most of our inbound Orlando destination weddings. Her brides typically have fifty guests or fewer. Many of her clients say that they decided to do a destination wedding specifically so they don’t have to invite 250 guests to attend. Some of them do it for budgetary reasons, others do it because they don’t want to be “on stage” on their wedding day.

Aimee’s clients typically spend between $3000.00 and $12,000.00 on their entire wedding. That certainly seems like a big savings over an in-town traditional wedding.

Michele Butler and I typically handle the outbound destination weddings and the large in-bound destination weddings. Our clients for outbound weddings typically have ten to 100 guests and spend starting at $40,000.00. That’s a lot of money for ten people! The reason these couples do it, usually has something to do with sentimentality. They want to be married in a place that is very special to them and they want to share that place with their guests.

Our inbound destination weddings spend anywhere from $40,000.00 to $150,000.00 or more. These weddings typically have 150 guests or more. These couples usually say they marry here because the guests live all over the country, or all over the world, and they wanted to have their wedding in a location that was easy to travel to and had lots of things for their guests to do.

So, can you save money planning a destination wedding? Absolutely, but you have to plan carefully!

Planning a wedding is no easy task. The months leading up to your big day are going to be filled with excitement, emotions and big spending. The best way to make sure you don’t start your new marriage horribly in debt is to determine what you can spend and how you are going to spend it. Below are my top five secrets that will help you create a meaningful budget and stick to it.

1. Create an accurate guest list. Your biggest expenses, like your food and beverage bill, linens and centerpieces will be greatly influenced by your guest count. That makes the guest list the single most important variable in your budget. Whether you do it by spreadsheet or index cards, before you do anything else, decide how many people you will invite and how many will actually attend.

2. Determine what is most important to you. Typically I find that the food and beverage bill accounts for nearly half of a wedding’s overall budget. So, if you are going to spend $30,000 on your overall wedding, figure $15,000 of that will go to feeding your guests. That leaves you with only $15,000 to spend on everything else. You will be surprised how fast that money goes. You must determine the items that are most important to you. Do you want an extraordinary gown? You may have to cut back on the flowers. Do you want a 10-piece band? You may have to cut back on the photographer.

3. Don’t forget extra fees. In Orlando, most hotels and restaurants charge a 22 percent service fee and then tax on top of this. On a $10,000 food and beverage bill, that adds almost $3,000.00 in fees. You can also expect chef attendant fees if you do action stations. Some locations also charge cake cutting fees if you don’t purchase the cake from them. These fees can really add up. Don’t forget to plan for them.

4. Once you know what you can spend on each service, share that with the vendors you meet. Hopefully all the wedding professionals that you interview are, well, professional. If they are, they won’t hesitate to help you figure out how to get the most for your dollar. If you have $800.00 to spend on a wedding gown, tell the salon that’s all you have to spend. They will show you beautiful gowns that you can afford rather than tempting you with something out of range.

5. Set up a wedding bank account or debit card. This will keep you from digging into your savings or going into credit card debt. Also, if you have people helping you pay for your wedding, you can have them contribute directly to the account. This will help you avoid the pain of calling that person every five minutes when you need financial help. It also will make that person less likely to give you unsolicited advice with every decision you make.

Following these five easy tips will make shopping for your wedding a much more pleasant experience AND you won’t return from your honeymoon with a big case of shopper’s remorse. More great tips for planning the wedding of your dreams can be found are on my new dvd, Susan Southerland’s Just Marry! Wedding Planning Secrets, available on justmarry.com or amazon.com. All those who purchase a DVD receive free access to all my favorite forms.

YES, YES, YES!

I have to tell you. I am planning destination weddings for two clients, one in Italy and one in the Bahamas. It is a very different experience from planning one locally. It is much more time consuming. I plan weddings all day long. I can’t imagine fitting in all the details if I were working a full time job AND planning my wedding.

Here is what we need to do to get the marriage license in Italy:

Get copies of birth certificates with an Apostille.
Have the documents translated into Italian.
Go to an Italian Embassy and swear in person that you are eligible for marriage.
Go to the region where the wedding takes place to get an Atto Notorio.

Then, weddings in Italy can only take place in the town hall. So we have to have the official wedding in the morning in the town hall and a symbolic wedding at their desired location in the afternoon.

The most interesting part of this wedding is that we had to get permission from the mayor of the town to get married in July since they typically do not do weddings in July or August. Pheww!

I always learn something new!

In the end, my bride and groom are going to get the wedding they always dreamed about… but it is a lot of work. If you have dreams of getting married in Europe, or some exotic locale, make sure you know what you are getting into… Most importantly, hire a good, patient and determined wedding planner!

Hi All,

I am very, very excited. After working for a year, my new wedding planning DVD is finally here and available to you! Susan Southerland’s Wedding Planning Secrets has my most sought-after advice in one DVD.

I share my secrets for choosing colors, creating a reasonable budget, dealing with vendors and organizing the day. Check out the website for more information.

I will be at the Perfect Wedding Guide wedding show on Sunday at the Buena Vista Palace. If you are in Orlando, come see me. I am looking forward to discussing your wedding plans with you and on my table, is my Ten Inspirational Ideas for an Out of the Ordinary Wedding idea list, to assist you in planning a memorable wedding!

I hope to see you there!

With Valentine’s Day right around the corner, it brings to mind a very important issue regarding planning your wedding budget. While February 14th is a very romantic day to wed, did you know that flowers, particularly roses, are much more expensive this time of year? It isn’t the florists being greedy, the demand for roses is just so high at that time of year, that the wholesalers charge the florists more per stem.

If you don’t want to change the time of year for your wedding, there are tricks to combat this price increase. Try decorating with more candles. There is nothing more romantic then candle light. You can also use statues or other objects of art for the center of the tables. Gorgeous linens and place settings create a beautiful table as well.

Go to a reputable florist and discuss your wedding date vs. your spending parameters with her. She will be able to give you suggestions to make the most of the money you spend on your flowers.

Now be sure to take an evening off from your wedding plans and spend a lovely, romantic evening with your bride or groom-to-be. I always want to make sure hat while going through the wedding planning process that you don’t neglect the one you love. It is important to work on your relationship while you are working on your celebration.

I just attended my first wedding in one of those famous wedding chapels on the Las Vegas strip. What an experience! It was amazing. They really have weddings down to a science in Vegas.

The bride, groom and the guests arrived and gathered in the lobby of the chapel. The lobby was also the gift shop. You could buy everything there from an Elvis wig to toasting flutes. They had a huge variety of bride and groom t-shirts, shot glasses, mugs and Las Vegas memorabilia. Well, maybe that sounds a bit tacky, but the lobby was no indication of what was to come.

When it was time for the wedding, the chapel doors opened. The inside had lovely wooden pews, the ceiling was also made of wood. There were silk arrangements on the alter that looked nice. Once in the chapel, you might have thought you were sitting in your church from back home.

The ceremony was short and sweet and was broadcast over the Internet for friends and family who couldn’t make it to Las Vegas. After a few quick photos, we were all escorted out to the parking lot where a sign overhead read Just Married and had my friends’ names on it. The entire process took about a half an hour and from what I understand, was very reasonably priced.

If you are looking for a budget-saving, fun way to get married, you may want to check out Las Vegas. They are well-prepared to help you with your wedding plans.

Happy New Year, everyone! I hope those of you who have been planning your weddings took a well deserved break over the holidays to enjoy family and friends. To those of you who got engaged over the holidays (and I know there are lots of you, congratulations! What an exciting way to start the new year.

Most of you will be eager to get started planning and hiring for your wedding. I cannot stress enough that now is the time for you to sit down and plan your wedding budget. Before you attend a bridal show, or try on your first wedding gown, you must decide what you are going to spend for your wedding and how you are going to spend it.

A big item that affects how you are going to spend your money is to decide who you are going to invite to the wedding. The number of guests who attend will be the single biggest impact on your overall wedding budget. Feeding 200 guests is quite a bit more expensive than feeding 125. You also have to consider that you will need more table linens, centerpieces and favors if you have a larger number of guests.

Get out those calculators, start thinking about your wedding budget, and happy planning!

I have been working on a really spectacular event. It is one of the more expensive ones in my career. But even with all the money they are spending, they are stressing out over the event budget.

I should go back a bit on this story. I was hired on this event after several of the most expensive vendors had been hired. Actually the client brought me into the event with the hopes that I could help reduce her expenditures. I told her I couldn’t promise that, and I certainly couldn’t alter the contracts she had already signed, but I agreed to do the best I could.

Six months later, we are struggling to trim and tighten the budget. It is nearly impossible. In fact, the only significant cut we could make is to reduce the number of guests.

Why am I sharing this unfortunate story? Well, its because I want to emphasize how important it is to do a budget FIRST! Whether you are spending $5,000.00 or $500,000.00 you have to know what your priorities are when it comes to spending money.

Planning a wedding is a marriage (what a bad pun) of creativity and good business sense. You must know how to take the money you have and shift it around to hire the best vendors for your wedding day. It takes discipline. If you overspend in one area, you have to compensate in another.

Do your parents and yourself a favor, plan a detailed wedding budget and stick to it!