and why spend that much on a meal and some drinks.
Basicly someone i know is geting married and theyre going to spend 60 quid per person on the wedding guests, and having 50 odd guests.
Why not save the cash and spend it on the mortgage or leave it in the bank,ands asits usualy the ladys parents who pay,what happens if theyre unemployed or short of money.
Then there is the question of what to buy them for a wedding present,something novel, cheap and memorable please
£60 per head, screw me I wish mine was that cheap and I have 140 guests.
This whole wedding thing has spiralled severely!
As for gift ideas, vouchers for the honeymoon as they like us will most likely be very poor post wedding.
My mates wedding was about £7k, his divorce was nearer £40k.
He said his divorce was better value.
The trick is just to book a party and not mention the word wedding.
but no, they don't have to be that expensive.
If I was shelling out £60 per person I'd find cash a very thoughtful and memorable gift.
as its usualy the ladys parents who pay
well that's the [i]tradition[/i] but it doesn't always happen that way.
Apart from mrs_d's dress and a couple of nights in the bridal suite for us, I paid for everything at our wedding. Twenty guests max - close family only; no stupid disco. Civil wedding at a hotel (which just happened to also be a 14thC castle!) and photographer - total cost to me about £4k.
It doesn't [i]have[/i] to be a £30k tasteless splurge inviting everybody who's ever met the bride or groom or their parents...
Yes they do cost a silly amount. I lost it slightly when we got to paying £200 for some seat covers, followed by a photographer who wanted £1500 and insisted on being fed in his contract....
You only do it once......
You only do it once......
well that's how it's supposed to go... I don't think some people read that bit in the contract though
£2500 for a 2 day wedding for 100+ guests, all in.
People still tell us what an amazing day(s) it was, all it takes is hard work and some creativity and getting your mates to help out, instead of waste their money on pointless wedding gifts.
Amazes me how so many folk spend so much money on their wedding and moan about how they struggle to pay their mortgage, strange world we live in.
Got married in a registry office, bought a couple of mates a slap up dinner for being witnesses, spent the rest on doing up my house..
Cars, do they really cost that much?
Or HiFi, or football tickets or...
all it takes is hard work and some creativity and getting your mates to help out
Now I see where you're coming from.... the exact opposite direction from us. We went for the approach of paying a venue to do pretty much everything for us, we just had to choose the sort of event we wanted
Chatting with my old next door neighbour, he said he spent £75,000 marrying off his two daughters, both having the full on traditional ****stani wedding.
He'd been saving up for 25 years, since they were born, and now has nothing, no savings, no pension.
Seems a bit daft to me, but fair play to him for the whole thing.
If you've got the money then chuck 1000's at your wedding.
For those who haven't got it (and borrow to pay for it) then all I would say is don't get brain-washed into the idea that your wedding day will be the most memorable day of you life. Yes it will be good, and hopefully good fun and not too stressful! But after 22 years of marriage I can honestly say that I have had many, many more memorable days and moments than my wedding day.
Treat it as a big party and nothing more.
Do people's parents still fund these things? I wouldn't dream of spending anywhere near what we are unless it was my money.
I proposed after 12 longs years of avoiding it in April... Such was the surprise my 28 year old now fiancé had a stroke haha...
Anyway if you want a venue that is not a grotty worn out hotel then you can expect the venue alone to be at least £5k we have found... And even some at that price are not great.
£50 a head is pretty standard for just a basic 3 course meal.
£1000 for a photographer for the day, without getting ANY photographs is in normal, and cheap. An album... £500 extra, memory stick with photos £300 extra.
Wedding dresses that are not mass produced by debenhams, at least £1k
Drinks packes from £15 per head is normal, not many cheaper (we picked a venue that has let us take our own drinks, with no corkage fees, which can be £7.50 a bottle or more).
I don't know many people by any stretch of the imagination, in fact I lead a quite boring friendless life compared to some, but we got to 80+ people in the day, and 120+ in the evening.
The most costly part of all... Family relationships... Right from the start all you get is 'are you inviting such and such'... 'why are you not inviting you 5th step cousin'.
I now know why I put it off for 12 years, and I wish I had put it off another 12 years... It's frankly a farce and not worth it.
And no parent do not pay for a thing any more... Gone are the traditions
Oh and split up parents throw a whole other spin on things
First time around our folks paid for it 50/50. Not silly money but still not cheap (as chips) with church, cars, do etc.
Second time myself and current OH paid. Ourselves plus 4 for the reg. office, very good meal in a private room at a very good restaurant then w/e in Paris. We then had a party at home, built a full bar outside inc. optics and hired a barmaid.
Both were good.
now a days i think it comes down to people trying to outdo their mates weddings spending a couple of grand more as each wedding comes along.
but is it worth it for one day.
biglad - Member
now a days i think it comes down to people trying to outdo their mates weddings spending a couple of grand more as each wedding comes along.
If I had mates like that, they wouldn't be mates
Our wedding cost a grand at most.
No they don't have to cost anything like that at all, just look around and you will find them cheap enough. We got married here and it's still cheap, not even £500 never mind £5k for the place.
http://www.embletonhall.com/en/countryside-hotel/weddings
My brother and sis-in-law when they got married, (second time for each). Dressing up optional...
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It's only as expensive as you want it to be, although, to be fair, the evening do was at the Ogri MCC clubhouse, so costs were minimal. 😀
We're getting married in August, all in it will come to something like £15k for 60 guests. Yep it's a lot of money for just one day, and it does grate a bit. We're paying for it ourselves rather than the parents, but then we both have good jobs and no kids, so are time poor rather than cash poor.
Of the top of my head, cost breakdown is something like venue £2.5k (half price for booking a Friday this year), Caterers will be something like £60 / head, Free bar £1.5k, Band £1k, Dress £1k, Civil ceremony fees are about £500, my suit £500. Can't remember where the rest goes, but it all adds up alarmingly quickly.
As for whether it was worth it, I'll let you know in three months...
Bit like bikes. You can spend anything from £10 to £10,000.
And there is a whole industry set up to persuade gullible idiots they absolutely must have xyz or the day will be ruined.
We spent about 5k all in and had a cracking day with family and friends.
The original plan for our wedding was a fancy do at Durham Castle after the ceremony itself at the registry office. After looking at how much saving that was going to take, we decided to bin that idea. Were we personally going to get the benefit out of spending all that cash? No chance, it was going to be a special day anyway for us, so we re-evauluated the plans.
Stuck with the registry office, which in Durham is in a gorgeous building anyway and the staff were amazing. 17 guests at the ceremony that we then had a slap up lunch for in the adjoining restaurant which was the priciest bit of the day, but was no more than £30 per head. We then buggered off to a hotel for the afternoon before heading to the evening reception.
Rather than Durham Castle, we had our reception in our favourite pub in town. They closed the place for us, the chef did an amazing spread of food and then outright refused to take any money for it, and they even got onto one of the local breweries who got a special brew on for us. We then got nicely drunk, in our local, with our friends and family, and genuinely believe we had a better time than if we'd gone for the castle.
Then used the savings to go to Bali. Get your priorities straight!
Aye, as expensive as you want it to be. First rule is, never go to a wedding show. Second rule is, if you ever see a wedding magazine in the house destroy it with fire. Colleagues of mine at work spent £30000, they'd saved every penny for years, they had a nice day I suppose but it looked... Well, it looked exactly like you'd expect if a totally normal couple decide to spend £30000 on their "fairytale" wedding. Tiaras, pink everything, all that bollocks. Doves in a cage crapping on the guests.
I've spunked so much money on ours so far I was dreading the thought that I wouldn't enjoy it, divorced parents are a nightmare, children of random cousins also a nightmare, most things actually are a nightmare where wedding plans are involved.
That being said I can't wait, I also can't believe it's only about 17 weeks away!
I've come to the conclusion that "saving up for a wedding" only to spend the money on a better house has been a very good idea indeed.
I'm getting married in September cost in total around 15k I reckon I could have done the whole thing for 4 but the missus is a snob.
Ours was a bit shotgun, and thus very cheap as we had no money at the time. Mum and dad very kindly offered to pay for booze and food respectively. This is what I remember of the costs for 35 people:
£300 Church plus flowers, organist etc
£300 Food
£200 booze, plus some treats I had in the wine rack
£100 hotel room, nice 4 poster overlooking salisbury water meadows
£100 Photographer, a friend who did some studio shots with us on the morning
£60 Suit hire
Free Wedding dress, made by my wife
Free wedding rings, made by my father in law
Free invitations, made by my wife
Free venue, borrowed rooms in the lovely old place that did the food. My sis worked there.
Free car, borrowed a Bentley from work. It was black tho 😉
Free entertainment, used hi fi equipment I own
Still with all that free stuff it was expensive, and with lots of little things I've forgotten about.
The best wedding aside from my own that I've been to was in the Swiss alps, overlooking the eiger. That one must have cost a fortune, but they had the money and it was a great extended holiday for everyone.
Ours was small because most of our family are abroad and I only wanted close friends to be there. I appreciate that when you've got plenty of guests it can easily spiral out of control.
Its about priorities isn't it? For us the marriage was more important than the wedding - spent about £3k all in 12years ago. Friends and family helped with favours and it was the best day ever, truly a top party with all our favourite people, much more important than wasting thousands. That money's needed for funding subsequent children!
im not looking forward to the cost of getting married! i cant wait to marry my girlfriend though been together for 8 years and i still love her as much as i ever have if not more!
but house 1st, then my dog then i guess it will be a shotgun wedding!
Ours is going to be about 4-5 grand all in for around 100 guests. Lovely venue too IMO. I don't judge people for spending loads but it does seem a bit bonkers to me.
We could easily do it cheaper too I reckon.
Parents are paying a decent chunk of it.
About 5 grand for ours. We fell on hard times leading up to it and really struggled. My mum helped out with the food costs. Our wedding rings cost 40 quid for the pair and we had so little money at that time I had to sell a computer to buy them.
Go get married abroad e.g. St Lucia, lots of other couples about to ask as witnesses..it's also your honeymoon. Throw a party when you get home..cheap as chips..everyone happy.
Our wedding was brilliant. Mrs O's wedding car cost a fiver (cheers, Etive Taxis!). Mind you, he did clean it specially.
2 grand for ours in a small scottish castle. Another grand for a monster party back in nz for friends. Both exceptional fun. I have been to a couple of six figure efforts, one of which the groom told me the night before that he was banging the chief bridesmaid and had been for 2 years !
35 guests for us, at £25 a head - cake, flowers and cars sorted by friends and relatives, parents sorted our room bill at the hotel.
Mind you, the four week honeymoon in the Rockies cost quite a bit!
My parents paid for mine
No guilt I think it cost 10% of their cash savings and they had always said they would. I could have had an expensive wedding but actually it was cheap
I think getting married in a registry office with a smaller group and then doing an event later for the masses saves loads as then you don't need a licenced venue.
I didn't even realise a mate had done this. I assumed I'd watched him get married but actually it wasn't a legal ceremony.
My wife and I ran our own service in a deconsecrated church. We did readings and sang songs and made up our own vows. Sister decorated the church with foraged stuff
No photographer. Dad said the meal cost about the same as buying a pub meal for each person
We paid for wine but not a free bar as myself and so many cousins had been getting out of order at other weddings feeling obliged to drink loads as it was free
Married in the Town Hall, Back to the pub fot the do, no photographer we bought loads of cheap disposable cameras and gave eveyone one and told them to go wild! overall cost under £500.
I don't get the disposable cameras thing - given the cost of processing you'd be better buying a a half decent digital camera and passing it around. Maybe write "wedding camera" on it with a sparkly marker.
This was about 8 years ago and digital cameras were very expensive.The processing wasn't that dear either as we got a bulk discount for takeing 30 in at once.
