How To Stick To Your Wedding Budget

I was listening to a podcast the other day and a fellow planner mentioned that she would never work with a real estate agent who didn’t start by asking their client what their budget was. I thought – RIGHT?! The exact same should go for your wedding planner. The best way to stick to your wedding budget is to establish a wedding budget right off the bat.

There are a few simple things to remember that will help you keep your eye on the…price! Ha, see what I did there? 😉

1. Don’t look at venues that are way out of what you’re able to spend.
2. Don’t book wedding vendors that charge more than what you can afford.
3. To be frank, don’t consider any option that will blow your wedding budget. Once you see something that is way more than what you can comfortably afford, you’ll never be able to unsee it. It’s like, why go see a home that’s $150k over what you can afford? It’ll do you no good and it’ll make any other option seem less than.

It sounds harsh and it sounds like you’re being told what to do but really, it’s about knowing what not to do. Here at Simplicity Events Co., we develop two “wedding budgets” – the first is a spending plan which includes the number you’re comfortable spending and the second is your wedding budget, this is the maximum amount of money you can spend. We give our couples the option to develop both the spending plan and budget OR just the wedding budget. It’s completely up to them and we won’t stray away from what they’ve decided as a couple.

All in all, sometimes you end up spending a little less or a little more on certain elements of your wedding. This does not mean you’re blowing your budget. It means you’ll allocate a little more to one area of your wedding and reduce the funds associated with another. At the end of the day, once you’ve decided on a number – stick to it. We LOVE numbers and really feel that a good spending/budget plan lays the foundation for a stress-free wedding planning experience.

If you’re working with a planner, that planner will make sure your funds are being allocated in the correct manner. There are certain wedding categories that will take up a large portion of your wedding budget like your food and alcohol and so at the least, a budget allocation spreadsheet of some sort should always be the #1 thing you put together when trying to determine how much money you can spend and on what. Dealing with finances is a huge part of marriage so this is the perfect opportunity to work together as a team and make sure you keep each other focused and on track.

xo Amanda