Came across this on another blog again and wanted to share it with you all. It's genius!
*disclaimer: Our invitation will NOT be animated. Please do not set your standards that high.
hehehe...
Enjoy!
Friday, July 27, 2007
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
A lesson learned
This entry is especially written to those of you who will one day plan a wedding in the future. No one shared this bit of information with me and it is such a crucial piece of information that the wedding industry purposely hides from you.
All the books and magazines say that when searching for a reception site, you need to know the number of guests you are planning on inviting. This is important because some venues cannot fit parties larger than 100 depending on where you search. Everything I've read has really stressed the importance of knowing how many guests you are inviting. Granted, I still believe that this is one of things you DO need to decide on first... I've come to find that it's not exactly the whole story.
After the guest list, most lists of venues focus on the price per entree for each person. This seems very important because to figure out about how much a venue would cost you, you'd multiply your number of guests by the price per person. However, from what I've learned... you want to add $25-30 more per person than the price that is listed in magazines/websites to get the REAL price.
Sounds simple enough, right?
WRONG.
What every place I've looked at has failed to share with me is the food and beverage minimums. This is mostly dependent upon the day of the week and time of that day, but can also vary depending on the number of guests you invite thus requiring a certain size for a ballroom. From all the places I've called in the last three days, it seems mostly dependent on date and time... with Saturday evening being the priciest.
Now I know that Sat evening is the most popular date/time, but I really wonder... when else are people going to get married? So let's say Friday evening. Fri evening sucks. People who work have to get a day off and regardless of whether a guest lives in the city or not, they'll probably have to face rush hour traffic to a certain extent in order to reach your wedding site. Plus, everyone gets confused thinking that Fri was Sat when it really wasn't.
Richard suggested getting married on a weekday to save costs. I don't think anyone wants to do that either. Considering that 90% of our guests will be coming from out of town, I really think it'd be almost rude to ask them to come to a wedding on let's say... Tuesday. No thanks.
So back to the point...
No one tells you their food and beverage minimums up front. Not in the brochures, not in the menus, not when you first start talking to the catering dept person... no. They wait until they get all the information from you (your name, your FI name, your number, address, # of guests, date, etc) and THEN they drop the bomb and tell you it's going to cost $30,000 minimum.
It's almost like they want you to fall in love with their venue so that you will pay whatever they ask in order to get it. This seems to be a general theme throughout the whole wedding industry. Something I do not want to get trapped into.
The reason why I said earlier that the number of guests and price per person are important but actually not is because when you find out what the food and beverage minimums are, it actually doesn't matter. Notice how earlier I did NOT say that the minimums are based on the number of guests you are inviting. The only connection is that larger ballrooms will have a larger minimum because of your larger number of guests. However, most places I talked to had one general minimum regardless on where you had the reception on their site.
Why is it not THAT important? Let me explain. What I mean is... if the place is asking for $20,000 minimum for food and beverage and you're only inviting 100 people. That means it'd be $200 per person. That seems like a lot per person. You might as well invite more people, right? At least invite enough that the price per person is at an amount that will include an entree, hor'dourves and cocktails that's reasonable and you can max out the number of guests you can afford to invite. Make sense?
Therefore, my recommendation to future brides searching for a wedding site is:
On an interesting note... while I was researching, one place that actually included their minimums up front was the Hilton Torrey Pines/La Jolla in their wedding packet from their website. I remember looking at it awhile ago and scoffing at the idea that they would enforce a minimum. Little did I know that they were one of the few places that was actually being honest and upfront.
Now this is why I truly believe any woman that plans a wedding can definitely become a professional wedding planner/coordinator after her wedding. I've learned more about places in San Diego that I have in a long, long time during these past two months. And I've learned a lot about catering too!
Lastly, I think it's kind of ironic that the one place Adam and I were going to choose is turning out to have the highest minimum out of all the other places I've called by a huge margin. I even dare to say that it has a higher minimum than the Hotel Del. God sure has a sense of humor.
I have several entries coming up soon this week! Stay posted! Comment often! :)
All the books and magazines say that when searching for a reception site, you need to know the number of guests you are planning on inviting. This is important because some venues cannot fit parties larger than 100 depending on where you search. Everything I've read has really stressed the importance of knowing how many guests you are inviting. Granted, I still believe that this is one of things you DO need to decide on first... I've come to find that it's not exactly the whole story.
After the guest list, most lists of venues focus on the price per entree for each person. This seems very important because to figure out about how much a venue would cost you, you'd multiply your number of guests by the price per person. However, from what I've learned... you want to add $25-30 more per person than the price that is listed in magazines/websites to get the REAL price.
Sounds simple enough, right?
WRONG.
What every place I've looked at has failed to share with me is the food and beverage minimums. This is mostly dependent upon the day of the week and time of that day, but can also vary depending on the number of guests you invite thus requiring a certain size for a ballroom. From all the places I've called in the last three days, it seems mostly dependent on date and time... with Saturday evening being the priciest.
Now I know that Sat evening is the most popular date/time, but I really wonder... when else are people going to get married? So let's say Friday evening. Fri evening sucks. People who work have to get a day off and regardless of whether a guest lives in the city or not, they'll probably have to face rush hour traffic to a certain extent in order to reach your wedding site. Plus, everyone gets confused thinking that Fri was Sat when it really wasn't.
Richard suggested getting married on a weekday to save costs. I don't think anyone wants to do that either. Considering that 90% of our guests will be coming from out of town, I really think it'd be almost rude to ask them to come to a wedding on let's say... Tuesday. No thanks.
So back to the point...
No one tells you their food and beverage minimums up front. Not in the brochures, not in the menus, not when you first start talking to the catering dept person... no. They wait until they get all the information from you (your name, your FI name, your number, address, # of guests, date, etc) and THEN they drop the bomb and tell you it's going to cost $30,000 minimum.
It's almost like they want you to fall in love with their venue so that you will pay whatever they ask in order to get it. This seems to be a general theme throughout the whole wedding industry. Something I do not want to get trapped into.
The reason why I said earlier that the number of guests and price per person are important but actually not is because when you find out what the food and beverage minimums are, it actually doesn't matter. Notice how earlier I did NOT say that the minimums are based on the number of guests you are inviting. The only connection is that larger ballrooms will have a larger minimum because of your larger number of guests. However, most places I talked to had one general minimum regardless on where you had the reception on their site.
Why is it not THAT important? Let me explain. What I mean is... if the place is asking for $20,000 minimum for food and beverage and you're only inviting 100 people. That means it'd be $200 per person. That seems like a lot per person. You might as well invite more people, right? At least invite enough that the price per person is at an amount that will include an entree, hor'dourves and cocktails that's reasonable and you can max out the number of guests you can afford to invite. Make sense?
Therefore, my recommendation to future brides searching for a wedding site is:
- Decide on about how many guests you'll be having. An estimate should suffice.
- Come up with a list of possible venues within a reasonable price range taking into considering the price per person. (Don't forget to add that extra $25-30 per entree.)
- CALL first to ask about their food and beverage minimums. This will give you a real sense of whether you can afford it or not.
- Visit the site in person. Ask a lot of questions to the catering department.
On an interesting note... while I was researching, one place that actually included their minimums up front was the Hilton Torrey Pines/La Jolla in their wedding packet from their website. I remember looking at it awhile ago and scoffing at the idea that they would enforce a minimum. Little did I know that they were one of the few places that was actually being honest and upfront.
Now this is why I truly believe any woman that plans a wedding can definitely become a professional wedding planner/coordinator after her wedding. I've learned more about places in San Diego that I have in a long, long time during these past two months. And I've learned a lot about catering too!
Lastly, I think it's kind of ironic that the one place Adam and I were going to choose is turning out to have the highest minimum out of all the other places I've called by a huge margin. I even dare to say that it has a higher minimum than the Hotel Del. God sure has a sense of humor.
I have several entries coming up soon this week! Stay posted! Comment often! :)
Monday, July 23, 2007
Back to square one? or maybe two...
Just when I was starting to feel like the ball was finally rolling on the whole wedding planning thing... it's hit a pretty large roadblock:
Food and beverage MINIMUMS.
It's amazing how much these minimums are.
Argh.
Food and beverage MINIMUMS.
It's amazing how much these minimums are.
Argh.
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