Cheapish wedding - what can you reasonably get away with?

[ethelb]

I'm newly engaged and looking at getting married next spring. We are looking at 90-100 guests with a reception in a village hall.

Our key priorities are:
Enough food
Lots of booze
Seated meal
Not too expensive for guests to attend.

I was planning on doing the following:
Photographer to do family pics in the morning or even day before can you do this??)
Ceremony in Winchester/Suffolk, probably walking distance from main station (most guests traveling will be coming from London).
Friends and family providing live music for ceremony.
Village hall reception somewhere 10-20 mins away (max half an hour)
Providing more than enough cider and beer for everyone (local breweries to provide kegs with bottles of stuff on tables for meal)
Fork sit down buffet for main meal/served meal if we can stretch to it
Wedding cake for dessert
Cider for toasts
Cheese and biscuits evening snackage
Ipod disco
Staff to cater the food+drinks/clear away

I will also look into block booking some hotels for guests.

I will not be providing:
Any booze other than beer and cider, unless we have a pay bar at the village hall (some do). Is it ok to point out what you are providing and ask people to BYO anything else they want to drink?
Transport to reception venue
Photographer for reception
Wedding favours
Band
Champagne for toasts

So, please let me know which of those would enrage you the most!

PS Any recomendations for reasonable caters in Hampshire/Suffolk/Essex?!

I think that sounds more than generous.

Sounds good to me!

Also shop around for the cake. M&S and Waitrose both do nice wedding cakes - just went to a wedding last summer and they had this cake, it was beautiful and very lush www.marksandspencer.com/classic-rose-sponge-wedding-cake/p/p21037151

Have you thought about village halls that are actually walking distance from a station? I know a lot of village halls and part of their charm is that they are quite isolated and just not near any stations !

I know of one near a station! Visiting it this weekend actually! But woudl actually prefer some of the more isolated ones with a field etc for additional space/parking.

Ragwort, where are the village halls you know of? Hampshire/Suffolk/Essex by any chance?

It sounds absolutely fine, but please at least think about how your guests are going to get to your reception venue? You don't have to pay for it but make sure it's at least possible for guests who don't drive!

Naoko the most likely two ceremony venues have a taxi rank outside. Otherwise we would ask people if they needed cabs booking and get them ordered before hand.

Congratulations! Your overall plan sounds great.

Personally, I would want something more substantial for the evening food. I would only eat cheese and biscuits if I was desperate. You don't have to do a huge buffet, but I would consider having something else to offer as well.

I think you are being very generous to provide beer/cider I assume for the whole evening. You don't have to do that although I'm sure guests would appreciate it.

Have you thought about where your guests are going to store their own drink? There will be drivers/non drinkers /kids/people who prefer spirits or wine. They'll want somewhere to keep their drinks cool, but how do they keep them separate from other guests' bottles?

I was planning to have a fairly substantial meal for the wedding breakfast, we are currently looking at something like a beef stew and gratin dauphinous for the main meal, with (heavy gooey chocolate) wedding cake and ice-cream dessert.

So would cheese and biscuits, plus something like lots of pork pies and olives and pickles be substantial enough?