Best way to minimize stress during the first few steps of wedding planning? Don’t put the cart before the horse.
When starting the planning process, I strongly recommend completing your first 3 steps, in the order below:
- SET YOUR BUDGET.
This absolutely needs to be figured out first. Without a budget, you don’t know how many people you can afford to host. You don’t know what type of venue you can afford to host the wedding at. As much as I hate to say it, the vast majority of your wedding planning decisions will be based around your budget.
Keep in mind, there are two ways to define budget. First, budget may mean inexpensive. Generally, that’s where people’s first thought goes, right? But budget also means total fixed amount you have to work with. Your budget may be $2000, your budget may be $50,000. No matter what that number is, calculate what you are able and willing to spend without putting day-to-day living costs on the back burner.
Thinking about opening a credit card for wedding expenses? For relying on parents to contribute? I promise we will chat about that later!
- CREATE YOUR GUEST LIST.
I can’t tell you how many brides I have seen post recently in wedding forums that they don’t know what to do because they are inviting more guests than their venue can accommodate (huge no-no). A venue cannot magically expand to accommodate everyone you would like to invite. And, over the last few years, the rule of thumb regarding the percentage of guests that will decline the invite has gone completely out the window. To save yourself a headache or being crushed because you’re in love with a too-small venue, develop your guest list next. Knowing the maximum number of people you need to accommodate at a venue, pay to feed, etc., will play heavily into how you utilize your budget and what venues you opt to tour or reserve.
Parents asking to add people to the guest list? Not sure to invite plus-ones or kids? Yep, we’ll talk about that later, too!
- Nowwwww SELECT YOUR VENUE/DATE.
With your budget determined and guest list created, it’s now safe to start touring venues. How you decide which venues to look at is completely up to you. Some brides and grooms want a certain atmosphere and only want to tour venues with that aesthetic. Or it may come down to date availability. Looking back, about 50% of my clients toured venues and booked their wedding date based on venue availability. Whereas the other 50% have a very specific date in mind, perhaps a meaningful one, and choose to only tour venues that are available on that date.
In future blog posts, I will cover which questions are best to ask when touring venues.
Helping YOU say ‘I-DO’,
Your WedUcator