How on earth does anyone afford to get married?

[Orangetattoo]

Apparently the average cost of a UK wedding is £20,000!

I have no experience with these things, does this sound about right?

Venues alone start at £3,500.

This just seems totally impossible.

Anyone know of any much, much cheaper weddings?

I never totted up our total but I reckon ours was about 6k. We got married in registry office, flowers from mum in laws allotment, dresses from wed2be, reception in a social club, sister in law decorated room and sorted a cake. We had a street food van for the wedding breakfast and no seating plan. DH's cousin is in a band and we had them, no DJ, Spotify playlist. I did have hair and make up. We have quite a few photographers in family and friends so they took photos.

DD got married last year at a Hilton Group hotel £6k.
You can pay a deposit and pay the wedding off bit by bit.
Don't get me wrong 6k is a lot of money.
We're in an expensive tourist city.
For 6k they had:
*3 course meal for 60
*A glass of fizz or wine
*Choice of table cloths and chair covers
*The room hire
*Wedding coordinator employed by the hotel (fantastic)
*Evening buffet for 100
*DJ
You have to pay for the registrar separately.
Dds wedding dress cost £500 from Wed2be
Bridesmaid dresses from eBay
Groomsmen suits from an outlet, groomsmen paid for their own.
Table decorations from FB marketplace
DD did add extras to the day, things her and her dh wanted but the overall wedding for £6k was fantastic without the added extras.
She's now sold all the table decorations and bridesmaids dresses.
Or you could go to the registry office then have a meal/party after, hire a venue.

Village church then village hall reception decorated by ourselves, most expensive part was the catering, got my dress from a shop that was closing down so dirt cheap, no favours had a cup cake wedding cake so that served as favours/pudding, all together wedding cost £4,000 tops, as another poster said weddings are as expensive as you’re willing to pay.

We saved like hell and had the exact day (and day after!) That we wanted. We had help from family too however this was unexpected and we had the funds to cover it. We were engaged for 2 years and just savvy, paying everything off as we could afford it so we didnt have a huge lump sum at the end. We also had a small amount on a 0% interest credit card (3k)

It came to around 25k. 110 day guests and 50 more at night.
We did it in my parents field, in a marquee. With a BBQ style meal and a DJ for entertainment. Invites, table plan and flowers on tables were all DIY, my dress was second hand so a fraction of the original RRP. Most expensive things were the food and the marquee itself. It was exactly what we wanted and the best day of our lives. No regrets!

You can get married for a few hundred £.
It's weddings that can cost 10s of £1000s.

Do you want to be married, or do you want a wedding?

The snobbery on these threads is unreal. I think it's lovely if you have a wedding on a budget, ultimately it's about committing to each other and celebrating your love, but some people are actively sneering at those who spend more than a couple of thousand on their wedding day, suggesting that for these people it's more about the wedding than the marriage or that it's some kind of egotistical theatrical performance. Surely it depends on your financial priorities and how you would like to celebrate with your loved ones.

Yeah I find it strange.
Everyone has different budgets and ideas of what they want from a wedding. I'd never scoff at anyone doing a lot of DIY stuff to keep costs down if they either couldn't afford to, or didn't want to, spend a lot on a wedding.
But equally if people want to have a big party and can afford it then who's to say they shouldn't?
My parents paid for my wedding, it was under the average amount for the time, but not really a budget option.
....but you can get married for a few hundred pounds in a registry office and not have any sort of party. So the actual getting married part isn't necessarily expensive.....but it's not unreasonable for people to want more than that - and celebrate with friends and family. And that is the bit that's expensive

I made my own invitations, did my own flowers and got married in the off season (winter) which meant almost everything was cheaper... It still wasn't cheap but we certainly could have had a smaller guest list, chosen cheaper outfits.

Same, but we went for tapas.

There is a giant wedding industry with a vested interest in making you think that enormous spending on getting married is inevitable. It isn’t.

Registry office, pub afterwards, job done.

You can save loads by not going for "wedding" items to complete your wedding

The average budget type things - they're as pointed out in wedding magazines where all wedding services get advertised and can charge a premium bc it's a "wedding" - if you went to a wedding photographer, wedding cake shop, wedding florist, wedding planner, and so on - you get premium prices Vs just a photographer, cake maker, florist etc but they're not advertising in wedding shows and magazines

Depends if you want a big party and favours!

I loved my wedding, in 2007 it cost us about £8k. Half of that was the hotel for the reception.

If I had to do it again, I wouldn't spend that. I'd do registry office and a pub lunch.

Getting married is cheap, there is no actual requirement to have a wedding

We got married 2 years ago for £2.5k. We weren't bothered about big or fancy and no way were we prepared to splash out thousands and thousands on one day.

Registry office, photos in nearby garden, lovely meal in a restaurant that we'd hired out a private room in.

Only 18 people which saves a fortune.
Only £70 on flowers - my bouquet, page girls small bouquet each and 2 button holes
2 flower girls and one page boy. No bridesmaids which again saves a fortune.
Didn't bother with a hen or stag do.
Find a really good photographer but have him or her for a few hours rather than whole day. We had an incredible photographer for the registry office and nice pics afterwards.
Monsoon dress but altered professionally so it looked the same as one that cost much more.
Registry office, garden and restaurant all a short walk so no faff or expense of taxis or transport.
The private room in the restaurant was decorated by me on the cheap.

Honestly it was an amazing day. We had confetti, a lovely ceremony, beautiful pics ad the weather was perfect. We had enough money to cover unlimited food and booze for everyone in the restaurant so it didn't feel like a 'tight' wedding at all, we treated everyone really well.

It doesn't have to cost a fortune.

We got married last year and ours was £12,000 including our honeymoon and us doing a spa day the day after and our hen and stag parties.

We booked ours massively in advance to give us chance to save and worked out who we actually wanted there which helped set our budget. I handmade decorations and used artificial flowers which saved me alot. It also got money off the hotel reception because we decorated it ourselves.

For us it was more important for who was there and then we worked our way backwards from there

Also to add we had 80 people there during the day and 100 at night so wasn’t a small wedding

I love a big wedding! As a guest though, I didn't have one myself.

But the thread is about the cost, so of course people have responded talking about smaller weddings - if cost is a concern, there are absolutely ways of having a great day without having a big or expensive wedding.

11 guests
Registry office
Cheap dress & ring
Suit & ring he already had
Taxis to restaurant
Beautiful bespoke menu in private room

Total cost under £2k and most of that was the meal, so we could have spent even less if we'd gone for a cheaper restaurant.

It was perfect! Both of us would have found a big wedding incredibly stressful, plus we couldn't have justified spending tens of thousands on one day when we were scrimping and saving to renovate our house.

We asked the hotel if they could do a small wedding (their advertising was for 80 by day, 150 by night type of numbers). They literally got a blank sheet of paper and built a bespoke very small wedding for us. So it's definitely worth asking.
Including the honeymoon I think it cost us £6000 or so.

My venue was £750 to hire, exclusively ours for the whole day.

Consider getting married off season, it’s cheaper. I had an indoor wedding in November and it was fab. It didn’t matter about rain ruining my day or not. Also got a discount on the photographer.

My wedding dress was £500 from wed2b. I got fake flowers for bouquets. The only entertainment I paid for was £300 for a DJ. Anything else was free entertainment we made.

The most expensive part was the food, and in hindsight we ordered too much. Buffets are generally cheaper I believe.

Registry office = £140 (60 guests)
Dress = gorgeous dress handmade by dressmaker £300
Groom suit (Marc Darcy so looked gorgeous but can be worn again) = £250

Pub lunch @ 20 per head for 60 people (stater & main) = £1200

Wine (Half bottle of wine per person @ £15 per bottle) = £450

Cheese wedding cake =£150
Cupcakes x 80 = £160 (pudding plus extra for folk who turned up in the evening)

Band in the evening = £300

Bacon sandwiches for 80 = £240

Total cost for fantastic day and night = 3.6K

I had the absolute best time ever 😊

People said they liked our wedding. Registry office, lunch at a nice pub for 30. No flowers, tho the pub did do table decs & the registry office had nice flowers. Had a meal the night before as people had travelled. No hair or makeup or cars. Less then £750 & that was with cash behind the bar. 😁

This was a few years ago now but it's really all the frippery that costs.

In 2020 we got married mid week in registry office (us + 2 witnesses + 2 guests). No reception because it was a tier 4 lockdown and my husband was extremely clinically vulnerable). Everyone just went straight home afterwards.
£70 to give notice
£150 ceremony
£80 dress (on sale)
£120 one ring
£55 marriage certificates
Total £475

We did ours on the cheap.

Register office was about £80 (Monday or Tuesday are the cheapest days)
"Wedding" dress from ASOS £30
DH wore a suit he already had
Bridesmaid dress from TK Maxx £15
Kids' suits from George £20
Small bouquet and buttonholes from local florist £60
Pub lunch for 12 guests £200
"Wedding" cake (generic shop-bought celebration cake) £15
Photos taken by us and guests

The whole day came in under £500 and we enjoyed every minute of it. No pressure, no fussing over details, just a day with our nearest and dearest.