Share

I am extremely fortunate to come from a family where my parents are able to help me financially afford a wedding. When my sisters and I were younger, my parents announced a set amount that they would be able to contribute to each daughter’s wedding. I know that my parents never expected two weddings in two months, but I am blessed to have their support.

That said, there are many things that my fiancé and I are contributing to the wedding, as well, especially when little things pop up—thank you cards, postage, bridal shoes, programs, etc. “Little things” become big things quickly when you start to add up the numbers, so whether I’m spending my own money or my parents are helping, I’ve been making frugal decisions to ensure that I get the biggest bang for the buck on March 23rd.

Here are some ways that I’ve either saved money or tried to save money:

1. Making my own headpiece. My mother and I found a beautiful headpiece that we both liked, and my mom offered to buy it for me as soon as she saw it on. Price tag? $155 for some sparkly beads and feathers glued to a stick. Not going to happen. After three stores and $30, my mom and I found the beautiful flowered French lace, netting, crystal beads, and feathers needed to make not one, but two hairpieces. I haven’t decided yet if I’m going to wear a birdcage veil on the big day (will probably depend on how windy it is), but I’m going to make one for the heck of it. At Claire’s, I found almost exact replicas of some of the simpler floral and feathered headpieces I had seen priced at $40 for only $8.

2. Centerpieces and flowers from the grocery store. The island we are having our wedding on does not have much to offer other than some hotels and beach houses. Most everything must be brought onto the island, so costs began to go up when we looked into flowers. I had originally planned on getting my flowers from a farmer’s market, but there isn’t one within a reasonable distance from Jekyll Island. Upon a suggestion from my recently-married caterer, our flowers will be coming from a Winn-Dixie about eight miles from the island, with a final price tag for my bouquet, four bridesmaids’ bouquets, two corsages, seven boutonnieres, and ten centerpieces running under $500. Given that my original budget was $2,000, this was a massive savings.

3. Mixing and matching stationery. When we ordered our wedding invitations from Wedding Paper Divas on New Year’s Day, I was thrilled to find that there was currently a 25% off invitations offer. We had been waiting patiently for invitations to go on sale, but I had never seen such a big discount. 25% off was great for the invites, but we’re saving a lot more money in other ways. First, we used postcards for our Save-the-Dates. This hit a hiccup or two when some folks didn’t get them and we didn’t have a return address, but we saved enough in production and postage to mail out a second. 125 Save-the-Dates went out for under $1 each, including postage. Thanks, Zazzle! Second, we are making our own enclosure cards, place cards, and programs in a bold, complimentary color to our invitation suite and printing them out on cardstock on our home computer. Each of these ran about $150 each if we had added them to our invitation order, but now we’re going to save that $450 for use elsewhere. Third, we found thank you cards at Target that matched our invitation theme. $12.99 for 50. The manufacturer of the cards is actually a vendor we considered ordering our invites from, so the quality is impressive.

4. Hand addressing everything and stamping the rest. To add a return address to each invitation or a mailing address to the reply envelopes was $.30 each. For 125 of each, that was an extra $75 plus tax. Even printing out labels was going to be expensive, so I created my own design and logo for an address stamp that will be on the back of each invitation in one of our wedding colors. $13.95 with free shipping. Then, I purchased a beautiful set of clear, acrylic stamps similar to this one but with more flourishes to address each of our invitations with. Not only will this help keep my writing straight and legible, but it will be just the touch of shabby chic that I want our wedding to have.

5. Getting the proofs. Our photography was definitely the biggest splurge of the event. It was extremely important to us to have professionals that could capture our candid moments and the little details throughout the night. It was also very important that we have a photographer familiar with our venue and the lighting challenges that are presented, from starting with an outdoor ceremony to sunset shots on the beach to a tented, dimly-lit reception. When I first saw Chris Moncus’s photography at our venue, it was love at first sight. When we booked, we decided that the only thing that we really wanted was the ability to own all of our own pictures and reproduce them for ourselves, friends, and family at will. Given that a professional print was going to run $19 each, the money would quickly disappear ordering through our photographer. Although it cost us a good chunk of change to buy the rights to all of our own pictures, we know that it will save us money in the long haul.

Since we began this adventure many months ago, money has been disappearing faster than we’re earning it, so every little bit counts. With the five tips above, we’ve saved thousands of dollars, and hopefully only the guests reading this will know anything about it!

This affects comments on all stories.