The first step in your wedding planning, is deciding how much of your budget should be dedicated to your wedding venue.

For our next edition of “Just Engaged! …Now What?”, we thought we would talk about budgeting your venue. As if budgeting for a wedding isn’t enough of a headache, trying to decide what money goes where is a whole other thorn in your side. We want to give you the exact cut of your budget that should go to your wedding venue.

Once you sit down with your hubby-to-be and have established your workable budget, you can put aside a portion of that for your fabulous venue!

The average couple spends between 40-50% of their budget on their wedding venue.

Now when we say venue, we are referring to your reception venue as well as your ceremony venue. We personally recommend spending a bigger chunk of that money on the reception venue, because that is where your meal, entertainment, and cake happens! But it really boils down into what you find more important, the reception location, or the wedding location? Not only does it come down to the black and white fact of how much to spend and how much not to spend, though. There are also certain factors that come into play regarding where and when your wedding is. Don’t be overwhelmed! That’s what we are here for. Visions Event Studio has a team of expert wedding planners that utilizes an internal wedding budgeting system to assess your wedding budget.

There are three key steps you should take in order to assess your wedding venue budget…

• Have the “wedding budget” talk – You and your honey need to sit down and have a serious talk regarding how much you are wanting to spend on this wedding. Some things to consider are,

• Who’s exactly is paying
  • You two?
  • Her parents?
  • His parents?
  • Both parents?
• How big is this wedding going to be
  • Close family and friends?
  • Just you two on a getaway?
  • Everyone in the neighborhood and a plus one?

It is a tough task to complete! But once you establish a budget, it will make the rest of your planning less stressful and well organized.

• Set aside 40-50% of your budget – And don’t touch it! During your venue search, if you find something cheaper than you budgeted, well that’s always a plus. But do not touch your venue budget until you decide on your perfect venue and book it. It is better to have plenty than not enough for your dream venue!

• Decide what is most important to you – If you are planning on having both your ceremony and reception in the same location, then this problem is taken care of. But if you are having separate venues, then you need to decide how much of that 40-50% budget is going to the reception and how much of that is going to the wedding ceremony.

There are also some ways to help decrease the percentage. Some opportunities for a fabulous venue at a cheaper cost include…

• Book during the “off” season – Wedding venues are jam packed in the summer months. So booking your venue some time between November and April, you might just save yourself a decent chunk of money!

• Avoid Saturday – Aka the most desired day of the week for a wedding. Although Saturday’s might be ideal, that day comes with a price (a pretty hefty one, too).

• Rethink location – Many of us brides desire the most high end locations, and that’s fine! But if you are looking to save a couple bucks, you might want to consider having your venue be a public park, or large outdoor area, maybe even a small art gallery or something along those lines! Locations like that tend to be on the lower cost side. Also, venues straight downtown in Chicago will jack up prices. Having a venue just a few miles away might make all the difference in your venue budget.

No matter what your budget may be, we know you’re venue will be absolutely stunning. But if you need some assistance, Visions Event Studio specialized in wedding planning, wedding budgeting, and so much more. We would love to hear from you. Happy planning!