S recently became engaged. First one in my family! His fiance is one of four girls in her family - she is the youngest in age at 24 but the first to get married. We are all SO newbies at this wedding thing!
They will be on a budget (not fully determined yet). Have just started looking at venues. Hoping for a wedding next summer and currently talking 100 or so, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they end up pairing that down a bit as they discover the oh-so-high wedding prices!!!
Anyway, the current talk is about venues where you have to take their catering and venues where you can bring in your own food (as in, a chosen restaurant provides the food - not us!). They visited their very first venue today and left a little shell shocked at the prices even for basic roast beef and chicken (which is NOT what they pictured having!). On Monday they will visit a venue where you can choose your own catering service.
Here’s what I’m wondering. What does choosing your own catering service entail??? Do most of them agree to provide staff to set up and serve the food? How about if they have limited alcohol - like just beer and wine. Do you still hire a bartender? More than one? Is it become cheaper to buy your own quantities of beer/wine to bring to the venue to be served???
I have ZILCH experience with wedding planning. Of course, I’m not MOB, but they are willing and eager for advice and though provoking ideas. What are the “hidden” costs we need to be thinking about if we don’t go with a venue that provides (and requires) their own food???
I’d like to give them some things to think about. I did a CC search and bookmarked a thread about saving money on a wedding (oh, just about 30 or 40 pages to scan through…).
We are not talking a desire for lobster and steak here. She is Lebanese and we are French/Morrocan so I think they would love to have Mediterranian food. We actually have a neighbor with a great Greek restaurant who my S is close to and he may approach them…but again, they are just beginning the planning process.
How exciting. Congrats to all. I am not very experienced with weddings, but I think you can save money by having just beer and wine, and maybe one signature drink, along with some non alcoholic drinks, and probably bottled water, or maybe fruited water or something in a big container. Buying it yourself is definitely going to be cheaper. If you go that route, you could get someone to help serve, that doesn’t need to know how to mix a lot of different drinks.
Congrats! We are in the midst of wedding planning for D and I admit we are over budget. I see nothing wrong with serving beer,wine and soft drinks only. Our venue requires a certain caterer. Thankfully we loved the food at the tasting and he is a really nice guy. His prices are more expensive, but they include servers, cleanup, linens, bartenders. Make sure you ask what is included.
Frequently if a caterer or venue allows you to provide your own beverages, you should expect to pay a corkage fee. I’m not sure what the laws are in your area, but one of the reasons for requiring a hired bartender is to prevent any guest from overindulging or any underage guest from imbibing at all- the venue’s liquor license might be dependent upon having an “alcohol control manager” (in VA they are the ABC Manager) on site.
Almost everything can be negotiated. I would encourage them to think through what is most important or “non-negotiable” and proceed accordingly.
I’ve found that it is most cost effective to have a reception at an actual restaurant because then you don’t have to worry about rentals or decor (unless you want to spend on decor). If you have an event at a venue where food isn’t ordinarily served, you have to rent tables, linens, chairs, dishes, serving pieces, decor items, etc. Indeed, for some venues or menus, you have to rent kitchen components, ie ovens, cooktops, etc. All of those rentals add up very quickly. And venues where the room or rooms are blank slates will be much more expensive to decorate. 100 people is just the right size to take over a typical restaurant for the evening. Also, service usually goes a lot more smoothly at a restaurant.
Ideally, you would find a place with sn outdoor area for cocktails, then a place to move indoors for dinner, and then either indoors or back outside for dancing.
One potential problem with restaurant settings is often the dining room is broken up into smaller spaces but I actually like that because there are different places to go and as a guest you are not stuck in one room. But that means some people have to stand during speeches, etc., since everyone may not be seated in one room.
I agree with the suggestion to limit beverage choice to beer, wine and your choice of non-alcoholic beverages. I wouldnt do a signature cocktail because everyone takes one to try it, takes a sip or two, then abandons it. Lots of waste with signature cocktails.
Hotels often work out to be the most expensive setting because they nickel and dime you for everything.
Dh is Lebanese, and we had that at the party the night before the wedding, at a party we had After the rehearsal dinner. We also did baklava as the groom’s cake.
D is planning a June 2016 wedding and the reception venue allows alcohol to be brought in without any fees (good news), but charges a 21% uncharge on catering (bad news). D’s wedding planner has been very proactive in helping to minimize the catering bill by having linens, tableware, tables and chairs all supplied separately instead of through the caterer. Her planner is very reasonable in his fee and has been worth the money spent in terms of suggested cost savings.
Congrats to your family, abasket!
When DD moved her weddIng up four months we had to find everything fast. Restaurant venue for reception worked best for us. Nobody had to haul in and set up tables, chairs, linens, etc. The restaurant was one with a lot of “character” so no decor was needed. Their corkage fee was horrible so we just used their wines. We did extend to an open bar after looking at the guest list - we knew 90% would be drinking local beers, local wines, or no alcohol. The bar bill would have been higher if there had been room for a DJ and dancing (like if we had been able to take over the whole restaurant). We picked a family style menu of salads, pastas, chicken and fish dishes. The restaurant provided vegan options for those guests at no additional charge. They even provided a salt-free no carb meal for a guest who was on Dr’s orders at no extra charge. Restaurants can handle that kind of thing.
Congratulations to you all! What a wonderful time for your family.
ETA - when I was paying the bill the manager asked if we wanted the boxed up leftovers from those family platters. We had lunch for about 9 the next day!
I’m going to keep reading this thread. My daughter and her fiancé are at this very same early stage of the process and also likely to have about 100 guests and likely to be married in Oct. 2016. They have had some preliminary meetings with different vendors for various aspects, including caterers and for a venue they prefer. Everything sounds like it costs a lot. Now to digest and think through it more. I’d like to see if we can make this preferred venue work, which was chosen in part, not just cause they love it, but because they also thought things would be more reasonable (in fact, they are opting for a Sunday evening wedding because Sundays are cheaper). They already decided in advance to just have beer and wine.
Many thanks for this advice. I will def pass on “corkage” fee to the couple so they know to ask. I don’t think they would choose a venue where we had to provide tables/chairs, etc. - and I think they would not choose a restaurant - they would want a dance floor and prefer not to have to rely on outside for that. But we will see!!!
I personally think just beer and wine is fine. Of course, I don’t drink! So for me, party does not = alcohol. For me, party = cake!!!
I was on the event planning committee for my law firm for years, and was involved with planning several wedding-sized events each year. We very often had dance floors inside at parties at restaurants. So those are not mutually exclusive at all.
I am also going to be reading this thread. My youngest daughter is planning a 2017 wedding which gives us plenty of time. We found one venue that would work really well but we would have to use their caterer. He owns a local restaurant which has just ok food. Darn! We just can’t get excited about him so we are still looking at places.
Was that HyperJulie’s thread? Her wedding was at a museum, and the food was barbecue. She found a lot of things on line, such as centerpiece elements and bamboo plates, IIRC, and put together a very personal event on a smaller budget. (Without any cooperation from some key family members, poor kid!)
Personally, I think serving beer and wine, plus non-alcoholic beverages, is absolutely fine. (And I and my close and extended family and friends definitely DO drink! )
Maybe if you give some rough idea of the wedding location, people can suggest venues.
Prices are going to vary wildly by area and time of year. To give you an idea, I got married in a touristy spot in Michigan and used a local chef who owns a restaurant just before the real start of wedding season. His philosophy is to use as many local ingredients as possible which was great with us and then we chose local beer and wine (which ended up costing more but was worth it!) All in all, it ended up being about $45 a person for food and drinks. The food was a veggie pasta, chicken, and carved prime rib (along with the usual veggie sides and two rounds of appetizers)- buffet style. (The food was legitimately so good that we had people coming over the next day before they drove home asking if they could take goodie bags with them since the leftovers were left with us at our request. My B-I-L got married a few weeks after us and we had people coming up to us at HIS wedding talking about the food LOL.)
In an effort to appease the harder-alcohol drinkers we served hard alcohol from the end of the appetizers until about an hour after dinner. There was plenty of warning given about the cut-off of hard alcohol. We did have to get our own plates and whatnot but the caterer worked with an event place that does tents and dishes (and we did get our tents and everything from them) so it was very easy to coordinate with everyone.
Just as someone who recently got married (early June), the one piece of general advice I have for them is this: everyone and their cat is going to have something to say about the wedding and what they SHOULD and SHOULD NOT do. Politely nod your head and say “thanks, I’ll think about that!” unless people become pushy and then boundaries can absolutely be set. Personally, since we were paying for our own wedding, I didn’t have much tolerance for this type of nosiness by others and quickly put the kibosh on it because it got very old, very quick. Just be prepared for it.
I did a DIY wedding and, honestly, it didn’t end up being any cheaper than if we had been using a facility. While I loved our wedding and it turned out great, I highly recommend people don’t go the DIY route we did. Just get a facility of some sort and save yourself the headache!
ETA Oh some (potentially) hidden costs (just from our shopping around):
-Some make you pay extra if they’re providing dishes.
-Some make you pay extra for them to clean the dishes.
-Most provide water, lemonade/ice tea, and coffee as part of the package but then the beverage price increases depending on what type of drinks you want.
-Some charge differently whether you have severs walking around or just servers manning a buffet (if applicable)
… hmm I’m sure others will come to me.
Hidden Costs:
I am familiar with a wedding with rented venue. The selected caterer had a large added fee for ICE.
Never realized to ask if the venue had an ice maker. Lots of ice needed to be brought in for a 5 hour party for 150.
We are GULP 2.5 months away from a wedding for 120…and invitations have not yet gone out, and caterer has not been picked. We are planning on spending $7000 in total. Venue was $1700, which for this area is very reasonable. That leaves $5300 for caterer, drinks (we bring in), table linens, decorations. No professional photographer; they will come up with their own wedding outfits, band plays for free, evites instead of mailed invitations. We are having trouble finding a caterer for the money we have available in the quality we would like. (Just planning simple barbeque!) Perhaps we should have picked a restaurant instead of spending money on a venue!
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She is Lebanese and we are French/Morrocan so I think they would love to have Mediterranian food.
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Yay! sounds like some awesome food will be served.
Will this be a one venue wedding/reception or will this be a House of Worship venue for ceremony and then reception venue elsewhere? Having two locations for flowers, etc, can add a bit to the cost.
I agree that having a restaurant location can save money.
Read the wedding disasters thread as a heads up on how to avoid mistakes. lol
The one tip I often share with brides is…call everyone (florist, photographer, caterer, hair stylist, etc,) a month before to verify dates, times, details. Call everyone the week before to review again. Call everyone the day before or 2 days before to review everything. I know that sounds crazy, but my florist, who seemed to be the most level-headed person I was dealing with discovered during that “day before” phone call that somehow she had the wedding time wrong. She would have arrived with the flowers 2 hours late. I still don’t know how the previous phone calls didn’t’ catch the error, but thankfully, that last one did.
First…Hugs and congratulations! As the mother of the son…have you spoken to the bride and her mother? That’s where you should start. They may want to run the whole thing their way. Or they may want you to pay for everything. There are so many things to do…and you will do them. But first…enjoy.
Congratulations to all. I’ve planned one daughter’s wedding, which was 6 years ago. It was a great event. My advice would be to simplify. There are thousands of details to handle–you need someone who is really organized to keep on top of all these details. We used a wedding planner. She was worth every penny. You can get a wedding planner to help with all of the planning or just a few things or even just the week before and the day of the wedding. If you aren’t super-organized, it’s nice to have someone who is tracking everything. My D was working on a huge project at work right before the wedding and having someone doing all the last minute organizing took away some of her stress.
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