Weddings can be stressful but don’t necessarily have to be. Here are a few quick tips and guides for help in planning a beautiful wedding on a budget.
- Set a Budget. Everything you do after the proposal is going to be based on your budget and how much you can afford. Once you set that limit, you can view vendors and venues with clarity and a much more realistic approach. Here is a handy tool to set your budget: My Wedding Planning Budget and Checklist. Two more checklists come from TemplateTrove.com, a PDF checklist which can be downloaded HERE and from Wed Plan, which can be downloaded HERE.
- Get Organized. There are several planning sites out there that help you get organized and pull your thoughts together for your big day. Here are a list of three great resources: MyWedding.com, WeddingWire.com, and The Knot.
- Find the Perfect Venue. Here Comes the Guide provides different venues for different states. Our favorite thing about this site is that you can do a search by region or city, as well as having a very comprehensive search tool that allows you to select Site Type (Ballroom, Church, etc.), Site Views (Canyon, Cityscape, Coastline, etc.), Catering Options, and Your Budget ($ Bid dreams, small budget / $$ Everything in moderation / $$$ Budget? What Budget?).
- Attend an open house of the venues you have narrowed down. This allows you to get a good feel for the place and imagine yourself getting married there. A lot of venues offer open houses during the month but if they don’t, don’t be shy to call and set up an appointment to view the venue before you make any kind of final decision. Something that looks good on the web doesn’t necessarily look good in person. You have to be there in person to know if that venue will work for you.
- Create a Wedding Website. These are really neat resources that allow you to put everything in one place. Three of our favorite wedding website creation tools are on Wedding Wire, The Knot, and My Wedding. These allow you to customize your wedding experience, share photos, plan a wedding registry and so much more. Definitely a must in today’s technology driven world. The website is even mobile and tablet friendly and responsive.
- Find Vendors. There are so many vendors out there. From floral, invitations, wedding cakes, caterers, DJs, photography, videography and more, choosing can sometimes be really tough. One good way to find a top notch vendor is by checking their Google or Yelp reviews. People that are happy with something are going to write about it to let everyone know about their experience. The same is true about people who are unhappy. Reading their reviews gives you a little insight into if their clients were happy or not. Here at Austin Wedding Videographers, we have dealt with our share of vendors in the Austin, TX area. If you should need any help finding one and would like our opinion, please feel free to give us a call. Austin Wedding Videographers offers so many options and packages for videography, photography and DJ and would be more than happy to work with you to customize a packages that works for you.
- Prepare for the big day. With all of these checklists, plans and guides, you should be on your way to a smooth wedding day. Remember to delegate responsibility when possible and try to enjoy this wonderful time in your life.