Okay, so you are still teary-eyed after saying yes to your boyfriend’s proposal to live happily ever after. What next? It’s time to get your feet on the ground and plan your dream wedding.

Somehow, everything comes into focus and you start to panic. “So where do I start?” you ask yourself. For first time brides and grooms, planning a wedding can be quite daunting. You may take into consideration the possibility of eloping.

What better place to elope to than Las Vegas, “The Wedding Capital of the World”? Three hundred and sixty five days of the year couples from all parts of the globe come to Las Vegas to have the wedding of their dreams. The stereotypical “Tacky Vegas Wedding” is a thing of the past. Unless that is what you are looking for and then that is possible as well. This, of course is the beauty of a Las Vegas Wedding. Whatever your wedding dreams, wants and needs it can and will be done for you at a fraction of the cost.

You may consider the possibility of hiring a wedding planner, but do you need one?

Most of the wedding chapels in Las Vegas (both in the casinos and independent chapels) have in house “wedding coordinators”.

These coordinators will work with you to choose a wedding package and plan you reception (if needed). There are also independent coordinators that can put together the most intimate and extraordinary weddings.

If you are looking for a simple intimate wedding with just you, your fiancé, and maybe a few friends and family members you most likely will not need the assistance of an outside coordinator or planner. If your plans include a large wedding party, guest list and reception you may want to enlist the services of a coordinator who will be dedicated to your needs.

The question is what your needs are. Once you agree on what type of wedding you want, you will be able to decide if you really need a wedding planner.

A wedding planner or coordinator can be very useful as they know the ins and outs of the whole Las Vegas Wedding circuit, but what is most important in planning your wedding is arming yourself with information. Weddings are big business in Las Vegas and if you were to do a search on the internet you will see story after story of couples who felt misguided or deceived by wedding chapels, coordinators or venders simply because they didn’t’ understand or ask how things worked.

Research is the best investment you can make for your big day. A guide such as “The Vegas Wedding Book” written by a Las Vegas Wedding Chapel insider, is full of tips, questions to ask and chapel secrets to assist couples with planning their wedding without being taken in by hidden charges. It is advisable to do your own research as is suggested in this guide prior to making any decision or plans for your wedding.

Enlisting the help of a wedding planner may be the route for you in creating a stress-free environment before your wedding date and on the big day itself. However, you have to contend with an additional budget for their services. The payment for wedding planners vary depending on how they charge, whether it is package style or if they ask for a per hour rate. Some wedding planners base their fees on the total budget for your wedding.

Here are some of the reasons why you may opt for a wedding planner:

1. Experience - Wedding planners have years of experience in wedding preparations and you can expect them to know even the smallest details that you need to take care of before your wedding. They also know the best wedding chapels in Las Vegas and they will be able to give you tips in organizing your special day.

2. Contacts - These people have been involved with the Las Vegas wedding scene for years. They are in close contact will suppliers who can give you the best deal for everything you need from documentation, photography, catering, gowns, etc. The best thing is, they also know which suppliers are reliable and which are not.

3. Information and Negotiation Skills - You can be sure that if you want to get the best prices possible for your wedding requirements, your wedding planner can haggle for you. Planners use their inside information to negotiate with suppliers and service providers to get the best deal.

Las Vegas wedding planning can be a thrill but it can also prove challenging for those who are not from Las Vegas. If it’s a big wedding with all the bells and whistles then a wedding planner can be of great service, but ultimately not really necessary, especially if you have the right guide.



Thanks to Abby Winthrop for contributing this article to our Weddings blog:

How to Make Money Online

While most of the couple today are thinking of preparing a fortune to spend for wedding day, some might find it hard to believe that planning a low-cost wedding is quite easy to do. Just like planning other kinds of wedding, planning a wedding on a budget is also a great and fun experience, and can be really unique and creative, as well! So if you are one of many couples who opt to have a cheap wedding without compromising what you have been dreaming to have for your wedding, there are several areas in your wedding where you can save money, such as your wedding location, reception and decorations.

One way to trim down your wedding expenditures is by planning of having a cheap wedding location. Planning to have this cheap idea is not impossible to do. In fact, you can have your wedding ceremony in some locations where you don’t have to pay any charges. Consider to have your wedding at a local park, for example. With local parks, you don’t have to worry about the renting fee and they don’t usually require any permit.. just consider checking it with the local city authorities before anything else.

Other great alternatives are beaches, a friend or a family member’s home, and at your own backyard. These are free places where you can held your wedding that will help reduce your wedding expenses drastically. If you and your partner are a nature-lover, a local zoo, nature reserve, or even at flower conservatory may be a free or inexpensive wedding location idea.

Another area where you can save some money is your wedding reception. If you are on a tight budget, you can always go with cheap wedding reception, and believe or not this is not too difficult to do either. One of the most popular cheap reception is idea is to have a pot luck meal. You can ask each of your guests to bring their own dish. But if you’d rather not ask guests to bring food for your wedding reception, then perhaps asking a few family members to get together and cook food as a wedding gift for you can lighten the burden.

Wedding decorations are not only fun to deal with, but they can also cut down your wedding expenses.

You can’t basically proceed without them completely done, though, but that doesn’t mean you have to spend a big amount of dollars, rather you just need to use your creativity and imagination. Example, buy only few fresh flowers for the flower arrangement, just finish it by inserting silk flowers. Or, you can make your own decorations such as streamers and decorative balloons. Purchase a few spools of ribbon at your nearest craft store. Grab few balloons and tie them together using the strips of the ribbon and make a bow.

Other ways where you can save money on your wedding is to purchase cheap wedding favors, inexpensive bridesmaids gifts, and discount groomsmen gifts. Giving wedding gifts to your guests and attendants doesn’t give you any reason to overspend your budget. After all, it is not the cost that is being valued, rather the thought behind it.



Thanks to Janet R. for contributing this article to our Weddings blog:

Wedding Tips

Planning a wedding can be a daunting experience. Most people won’t have organised a large event before, so it can be difficult to know where to begin.

Once you’ve decided on a date for the big day and booked the venue for your wedding or civil ceremony, the very next thing you need to do is book your reception venue.

The more popular wedding get booked up as far ahead as 3 years in advance; so to guarantee the fairytale wedding venue that you’ve always dreamed of it’s best to make this a priority from the start. In many cases you’ll find that if you’re not overly particular about the exact date you enter in to married life, then 6 months is often plenty of time to book the venue of your choice.

The majority of wedding venues will ask for a deposit as soon as you book and for the balance of the hire fee well in advance of your wedding day. The venue hire fee, which often includes many other costs for your wedding such as catering and entertainment, is often one of the largest investments of your day and people can feel uncomfortable parting with such a large sum of money so far in advance of the big day.

This is where wedding insurance is important. From the moment you start spending money on your wedding you should have a good wedding insurance policy in place. Wedding insurance doesn’t just cover financial losses incurred on the big day itself, but can help protect many costs incurred in the run up to your wedding including Wedding Dress cover , Wedding Rings and Transport cover and importantly Failure of Suppliers cover.

Specifically thinking about your venue, wedding insurance can help protect you in a number of ways in the run up to your wedding and on the day itself, including:

Cancellation Cover and Rearrangement Cover – Could help protect you from some of the significant costs that could be incurred if for instance your venue was unable to hold your wedding reception due to damage to the venue or if perhaps an important supplier such as your caterer didn’t turn up on the day. The Cancellation Cover in your wedding insurance could even help with some irrecoverable costs, such as deposits, in the event that yourself or your partner were made redundant before your wedding day.

Personal Liability and optional Public Liability Cover - With a large number of people gathered together to celebrate with you on your wedding day, accidents can sometimes happen. In today’s litigious environment it is wise to protect yourself against the cost of civil claims, for example, accidental loss or damage to a 3rd party’s property at the Wedding or reception venue. Wedding insurance can help protect you against such costs.

When they first start the search for their venue, many couples head straight for the big hotels. These hotels often offer a variety of packages for your big day covering everything from the catering and of course accommodation to flowers and even wedding cars. These packages can offer good savings compared to booking all the elements separately yourself. Often good value and undoubtedly convenient, be aware that some hotels run more than one wedding a day, so you could find yourself bumping in to another equally blushing bride in Reception, potentially taking some of the shine off your wedding.

 

For something a little different, have a look at stately homes and historical buildings. Many of these venues allow you to hire them exclusively giving you a more intimate feel to the day. Some people are put off by the fact you often need to book the catering etc yourself, but more and more of these potentially beautiful wedding venues will offer to help you plan your big day for those brides who would prefer someone else to take the strain.

Stately homes and historical buildings often come with beautiful grounds and therefore the opportunity for a romantic marquee wedding. Marquees come in all shapes and sizes, but for 200 people you could be looking at around £10,000 to hire a marquee that included everything you’d need such as carpets furniture, power and heating.

Although very pretty you must remember that marquee’s are only temporary structures so it is not unheard of for marquees to suffer damage while they are being hired out. Some marquee companies will expect you to cover all the costs of any damage, which could turn out to be considerable so it would be prudent to have in place wedding insurance with the additional Marquee cover option if a marquee is your ideal choice for you wedding venue.

Also don’t forget to check out local society buildings and halls as potential wedding venues; these can often offer far more interesting and memorable surroundings than a hotel or a stately home as they often hold special personal memories for couples and families alike and can be more convenient for friends and family travelling to your big day.

Start the search for your wedding venue online. There are a whole host of websites that allow you to search for the venue by area, by price and type of venue. An excellent feature of many of these sites is reviews of the venues by couples and guests that have experienced them first-hand. Make sure you read these reviews; a venue can give a really good impression when you go to have a look around, but it may be a very different story on your wedding day or vice-versa.

So remember, start looking early to make sure you find the venue that’s right for you, listen to what other people say and of course, make sure you have a good wedding insurance policy in place before you start spending a thing as you never know what will happen before your big day.

Wedding insurance from WeddingPlan Insurance

 

 



Thanks to Daniel Tangen for contributing this article to our Weddings blog:

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