Weddings in India require a huge amount of investment of money and time. We all want our wedding to be fancy, glittering, and special. But, when we look at the cost of all these, we shake our heads in sorrow. Planning a wedding that meets all the requirements and is still within the budget is a difficult task that requires lots of effort. Everyone wants to save money for their future, and spending endlessly at a wedding is not a good idea. The couples can plan their future with that money, which will be more fruitful for them.
So, how to plan a budget wedding? Well, we have some plans, tips, and tricks which will help you plan a budget wedding. Even a simple flower wedding costs high, but in the below-mentioned tips and tricks, you will get to know how you can reduce your budget at a wedding. Let’s start.
15+ Tips to Plan a Budget Wedding
An intelligent budget structure can reduce the wedding cost. You can be married, with grace, but at a low cost. Follow the tips.
1. Get to know about your financial status
If you are aware of your financial status and accepting it, then you are halfway down in planning a budget wedding. It is the bottom line of any wedding or any event. You should have a brief look at your savings, future needs, expenses, and such things before the big day arrives. While you are planning your wedding budget, take all these things in mind and then plan it. Rule out every doubtful thing, trust me, it will save you thousands.
You not only have to spend on the wedding day, but post-wedding expenses are also there which are waiting for you. Discuss the need for every arrangement from your financer, and avoid spending money frivolously. You cannot decide the exact budget before the wedding, but add approximately fifty thousand, or even one lakh rupees to your decided budget. Include everything, your attire, your family’s attire, jewelry, and everything, and spend money efficiently.
2. Make Off-Season Purchase
Wedding time includes lots of gift exchanges. When should you buy those gifts and other accessories? Well, make off-season purchases. It is one of the best ideas to cut down the budget in a decent manner. You always know that the product which will be in demand will always cost higher. So, to avoid this, buy next season items in the current season to plan a budget wedding effectively. It includes your attire, family’s attire, and many such things. You can even get your attire from your desired brand at a very cheap price. For brides, buy your Velvet Shawl from here.
Do all your shopping off-season. You might fall short in options, but you will always get your desired items at a cheap rate. When you buy summer clothes in the summer, you have to pay a high amount of money to make them yours. You can also see a premium collection of juttis from here.
3. Venue
Book your wedding destination in advance. Make sure your wedding destination is close to your home. This is because it will reduce the extra expense of rental cars and buses. Book your location in advance else in a healthy bali wedding venues season, it will already be booked by someone else. If you want average glittering in your wedding, choose a resort, banquet hall accordingly. Again a reminder, choose, and book your wedding destination in advance.
4. Fewer flowers
At your wedding destination, décor will choose flowers to decorate the banquet hall or the resort. Flowers are costly nowadays and require extra expenses. If you do not want to waste money on this, deny the idea of decorating the banquet hall with flowers. We cannot deny the fact that the wedding cannot be as beautiful without flowers, but we can limit the usage of flowers to save money. It can save thousands of money, plus also reduce the wastage of flowers. Never use unlimited flowers, and only stick flowers at those locations where you feel are necessary.
5. Be your own DJ
Use your own speakers. Don’t hire anyone to do it for you. Make a playlist which you will be playing on your big day. Ask everyone about their preferences, and make an exciting playlist. You need not hire anyone to do it for you, just ask any 3-4 of your friends to do it for you, and they can also switch their places at regular intervals. You can rock your wedding day on your own and save the DJ’s money.
6. Discuss with your Décor
Never allow your décor to decorate its own. He will not think about your budget, he will just fit everything costly and destroy your budget wedding plan. Decoration takes the maximum share of your budget and to reduce it, discuss everything with your décor. Ask him about the needs of everything he is placing and cut down on décor. Plan according to you and give that plan to décor, after deciding the budget of that plan. This will save lots of money which you can save for your future betterment.
7. Contact Wedding Planner
A wedding planner is one who is aware of everything where you can save your money. He might charge to give you advice, but you can spend hundreds, to save thousands. He is an expert in arranging such events, and he must be better at knowing where to purchase things from, where to go for caterings, what to put and whatnot, about mandap, about table toppings, about furniture, and such other things.
Talk to him about your budget, and ask to plan a beautiful wedding in your budget. He will do the rest of the things. You can also hire a full-time wedding planner, which will charge something extra but will manage everything. Here are some tips for Indian Weddings.
8. Never buy off-season flowers
This will cost you double if you are going with off-season flowers. Consider decorating with the things which are available in the running season. This will save thousands of rupees and also will fit in your budget. The same goes for catering. Never put such an item which is not available in the running season, try to buy things of the current season. Also, pick fruits which are available at the time of the wedding. If you are going with the off-season fruit of flowers, it will make your wedding some high enough to pay.
Think a thousand times before doing anything. Weddings under a budget is a big task and you have to cut short some things to fit in it. You have to compromise with some lavish things and make sure you are discussing everything with your elders.
9. Create a Rational Guest List
When you are running tight on your wedding budget, keep your guest list small. This will save lots of money in one go. It will directly save your food, your furniture, and everything. Think which relatives are your priority, discuss with your elders, and then send the invitation. Try to invite only those guests, who really mean to you. Inviting extra guests will only increase your wedding budget.
10. Plan important things in advance
Make sure you have planned everything in advance. Like, which resort or banquet hall to book, which wedding planner to hire, which décor to hire, what to serve in dinning, what to give as a gift, what to wear in a wedding, what about gold, everything. Plan these things so that things never rush on your special big day. Whenever you leave things for the last minute, it will only create a rush and you have to compromise with something or the other. Hire your caterer before one month, book your wedding destination and everything.
Last-minute preparation can increase your budget. It is a possibility that the local vendors and others required might be hired by someone else and you are hiring someone at a high cost. Thus, planning before the wedding is one of the most important things in a budget wedding.
11. Ask for wedding help instead of wedding gifts
Well, guests generally give gifts at weddings and not money. So, to not replicate this mention in the invitation card, that helps in wedding by giving money and not gifts. This will increase your wedding budget and will help you in thinking of your future plans like a honeymoon. If someone in your relatives has musical talent, ask them to perform at your wedding. If someone has a good camera and knows photography skills, ask him to be a photographer at your wedding. This will save you enough money and your wedding will be under your budget. Ask them not to give gifts, instead, any sort of help from your side will be worth enough.
12. Prioritize your needs
This is the best thing which you should do if your pocket is tight at a wedding. Prioritize your needs, compromise on things on which you can, don’t think to show-off, understand your limits, never make random arrangements, and choose things that are really important rather than just showing that we are well-off. This will only take your budget out of your hand, so it is important to work for things that are of utmost importance. If after completing all the things of utmost importance, you left with some money in your hand, go to the things of minimum needs.
By prioritizing your needs, you are not doing any shameful act, instead, you are saving money for your future. Doing it intelligently will give you a beautiful wedding by saving lots of money. A wedding planner can help you to stop investing in giddy things.
13. Make your own invitations
Yes, you heard it right. Create your own invitation card, invest some time in designing, talk to others, and decide the invitation card on your own. If you have a quality home printer, you can even take printouts on your own and that is, your thousands are saved. See other invitation cards, take ideas from them, design yours, and take printouts. This is only what you have to do. There are many websites like canvas, snapseed, and many other platforms available that can help you in designing a beautiful invitation card.
Guests which are not in your hometown, speed post them, or send their card online through any social media platform. This can save a lot of your budget. If you are bad at designing, hire a freelancer, which will do the best for you.
14. Jewelry Shopping
Shopping gold is one of the biggest tasks to perform at any wedding in India. Buy gold when its rates are down, which can save your budget. This is the thing where you have to invest most of your wedding budget. This is one of the most exciting sections of brides. Think a thousand times before buying anything.
15. Catering section
Most of the guests will judge your wedding only from your catering list. So, make sure you have included the desired food on your list. Do not go for many, go for the best. This will save you money and also mark your good impression. Do not forget to include deserts in your list because this is what guests love. If you are going for too many dishes, make sure they are not tasteless. Plus, ask your caterer to make food in good quantity so that not a single person goes without eating food. Cutting down the budget in catering can be a bit dangerous to your reputation.
16. Honeymoon time
Honeymoon expenses should also be included in your budget because it is also a post-wedding expense. Couples should pre-decide their honeymoon location and a fixed budget for it. Honeymoon is important to increase the bonding of the newly married couples, so make sure it must be good and at a good cozy location. The place does not matter as long as couples are together. Invest something extra in your honeymoon, it will be a memory of your whole lifetime.
These are all the ideas, tricks, and tips to minimize the budget of your wedding. Just make sure that as long as you are happy, you are doing everything right. Think about your future. The money which you will waste on a lavish wedding can be used in improving your own future after the wedding. You can take a flat from the spare money and can do many more things. Consult, think, pause, and then make a decision. Money does not grow on trees.
