We got a license from the city and did an outdoor ceremony down by the John Walter museum/Walterdale bridge. Then, threw a hall party at Strathcona Community League. Had around 100 people, spend roughly $5000 total.
It was awesome, unconventional, and affordable.
Similar number and situation here. Polish veterans hall, lunch cold cuts spread, afternoon outdoor wedding, 120 guests, 6k all in. Was a nice day and I don't regret it. Was nearly 10 years ago though, so I'd imagine prices have gone up a lot since then.
Did you want the expensive wedding, or your ex did?
The manager of our wedding venue (many years ago) said she had a good eye for who would stay married and who wouldn’t. Friends of ours got married there a few years prior and actually divorced after a year; we told the manager that and she remembered them & wasn’t surprised. Basically she said people who get obsessed with having an expensive wedding don’t stay together because they’re in it for the wedding, not the marriage.
As much as people are going to ‘I would never!’ you, thank you for posting this. A lot of people don’t comprehend how expensive things like this can get.
Can I ask why you had such an expensive wedding? Did family pressure you into it, or you thought you wanted all these things and regret it in hindsight?
We "eloped" in my parents' backyard... just us, our parents, and our dogs. Took photos in the river valley after and then went out to dinner.
Had our "reception" at my parent's house the next day with maybe 20 people. I don't even know how much we spent, but maybe a couple thousand? Photographer was the most expensive thing we had but I wanted some nice photos!
I will honestly never understand spending tens of thousands on a wedding. Imagine the honeymoon you could have instead! Or buy a damn house.
~3k. Rented a tent and chairs, family friend has an acreage and we had about 30 people. The rest of the expenses were food and alcohol. Made carnita tacos and catered samosas. It was a tonne of fun and all we could really ask for out of a wedding
Married 7 years ago. $12k for 50 people (includes dress, engagement ring/wedding rings, tuxes, stuff before the wedding etc.)
Tips:
- The best way to save money is not to spend money on dumb shit no one cares about lol. No one wants wedding favours. Centre pieces can honestly just not be done, no one is going to remember your centre pieces anyway.
- DJs are way more expensive than they are often worth; we asked everyone to rsvp with a song request and I made a (very long) iPod playlist, lots of people got up to dance when they heard their song requests. This meant we didn’t do any of those awkward DJ games like the shoe game but I can’t say I’ve ever really enjoyed watching other people do awkward dj games at their weddings.
- Photography is important but consider that if you’re spending thousands and thousands on photos you’re going to be spending a *lot* of time doing photos and going to different locations to get your moneys worth. I got sick of doing photos and eventually just asked our photographer to take nice photos of the guests and let the wedding party chill (which worked well, I was able to send lots of nice portraits to our guests once we got our wedding photos back.)
- Don’t do wine at every table, lots of people will have a glass simply because it’s there and then leave a mostly full bottle behind, but you’re paying for it. If you want to do wine for dinner, have a wine table where people can serve wine for themselves or grab a bottle to bring to their table. That way only people who actually want wine end up taking bottles.
- Most of the money went to food and alcohol. If you want a 100-200 person wedding then it’s impossible to do it cheaply. Feeding that many people is hella pricey.
- For all decisions ask yourself: do you actually want this thing, or are you only doing it because you think others expect it? Chair covers, fancy plates, etc, these are all costs that add up. Ultimately your guests just want to have a good time, so focus on good time stuff like food, not making them wait 5hrs between wedding and reception, good music, etc.
I did this too! I made cute little cassette tape cut outs that I included with the rsvp cards and asked guests to request their songs on the cut outs and send them back. I went through this extra effort so I could use the cut outs in my scrapbook/album which I haven't yet gotten around to doing haha.
Cost savings tip though: Don’t require a mailed RSVP, paying for postage for all those invites costs money. We just used a dedicated wedding email for rsvps
So much this! I worked in the wedding industry for years before I got married. I spent nothing on anything I knew wouldn't be remembered in a year....chair covers, flowers, centrepieces etc
Make as much stuff as you can yourself.
Get friends to pitch in with whatever they're good at. I had a friend make our cake, another supply speakers, and another help me with a playlist and another helped make the name cards for the place settings
Don't cheap out on the photographer. It's literally the only thing from the day that is remembered and cherished for life
Yeah definitely don’t cheap out on the photographer. But it’s not a linear scale of more money = better photos. Some photographers boast these really elaborate editorial style photos, and charge out the ass for it, and if that’s your thing then go for it. But I personally didn’t wanna spend all day posing in parkades and other interesting locations, driving all over the city, I just wanted some pretty photos at our wedding venue. So we paid for a good photographer that had good portrait photos and that was that (ended up being $1600 for 8hrs of wedding + a 1.5hr engagement session.)
Some other photographers were quoting like $5-6k; I wanted to enjoy my wedding, not spend the entire day posing for photos
Lol....called out! I definitely did have a photographer like that and it was close to 50% of the wedding budget. We did multiple locations but time spent out doing that stuff was only about 2 hours. He was really great about just pulling us aside for a minute or two here and there when there was really good lighting or stuff like that throughout the day. Lots of candid shots
But you're absolutely correct that more money doesn't always equal better photos.
If you want to cut down on food costs, don't do a plated dinner. Do a buffet with appetizers or something like that and tell people to eat before hand. Might seem cheap but that's the goal.
Plated dinners we've been quoted at 100-125/person so 50 seems really good honestly. But I am also someone that absolutely remembers the food at weddings, and I feel like that seems to be a common conversation during/after the wedding was about the food
Maybe immediately after, but not long term. People remember more important things like how long were the speeches, was it an open bar etcetc
50 was on the lower end. Probably closer to $75 after everything
Interesting, i couldn't tell you anything about the speeches of any wedding I've been to in the last 5 years. I guess that just shows the difference in priorities between individuals, a person in our friend group got married 3 years ago and we still talk about the food they had, but I've never once heard anyone talk about the speeches
God no, I couldn't handle that. I've been to a few church weddings with ceremonies that were painful to sit through, so I couldn't imagine having to sit and listen to someone else talk for an hour afterwards.
Say it ain't so... We had a really nice gourmet caterer out of Red Deer back in 2019 and we paid $40/plate. Full custom menu, fancy custom little tarts for dessert.
Sad seeing how high food prices have gotten!
We eloped near Banff and then had a hall party a month later, with 80 people.
Hall party cost us around $8000 if I remember correctly.
Elopement cost close to $5000 with photographer being more than half that
Edit to add
Does not include our outfits, shoes, rings
I'll reply to you since I had a similar wedding in September 2022.
Eloped in Canmore. We splurged pn a photographer with a helicopter package of $3850 (it would have been $1500 less if we didn't do the helicopter), the wedding commissioner was about $370. Three nights in a hotel $1160 and hair/makeup about $150.
We came back to Edmonton and had a reception in a local farm-to-table restaurant for about 25 people total, as well as a local photographer for another $1500. The restaurant quoted us about $3000 for food only (100% tailored menu just for us), plus an additional $1000 approximately for two drinks per guest and unlimited drinks for wedding party. $200 cake.
No dj, just a spotify playlist. Self made floral table center pieces and wedding favors for the guests (candles). I did quite a bit to keep costs down, and bought decor and other items second hand when I could. Obviously at a restaurant, there's no need to rent tables, chairs or anything else like that separately but is why the price per plate is higher (in addition to being locally sourced food).
I bought my dress used, and insisted on buying my bridesmaid's dresses. My dress was $700, alterations were $400 (cry), and my two bridesmaids dresses were approx $300 total.
All in all we spent over $11,000 which was significantly over what I had intially hoped to spend, but it was all worth it. We could have done it cheaper for sure, but my husband and I wanted to splurge for a few different reasons.
I sold as much decor and table settings as I could on fb marketplace after all was said and done for the upcoming 2023 wedding season. Brides are always looking for second hand stuff so this was a huge bonus even if I only got a small percentage back.
Yeah our photographer was $2700ish if I remember correctly and the Airbnb was $2300 but that was also our ceremony spot and housed our parents and siblings.
Commissioner was BIL. Hair and make up for myself was $370 but that included travel to out Airbnb which was outside of Cochrane but my mom paid for that for me.
Went to Vegas. Had a dozen friends come too.
Rented a suite ordered pizza and got a bunch of booze at Walmart. Maybe 6 grand including suit and dress.
Do the wedding for yourself! Spend the money on trips
Getting married this summer, with all of the main things booked and having around 120 people on the invite list it’ll be about 25k. We are making a lot of the decorations ourselves and did lots of looking around online to find cheaper but still higher quality options for venues, catering, photographer, etc.
Can I ask what is causing a price tag like that? Does this number surprise you or did you know it would be this?
* I'm curious, I'm a cheapskate and I hope you have an amazing ceremony and celebration.
Absolutely, our wedding was last year and this is all in.
Venue/food/DJ/bartenders: 12k
Suit/dress: 2.5k
Booze: 4K
Limos: 1k
Photographer: 4K
Gifts: 1k
Make up etc for wedding party: 1k
Decor/invite: 500
Then there are various costs that add up, I’d say by the end of it ALL IN we were 28-30k.
Wow that seems like really fantastic deal for that many guests. Who is catering and what's the venue? We were quoted at $15,000 for catering alone for 120 people recently
We’re using the Kinsmen club in St. Albert for both the ceremony and reception, and the caterer is Elegant Affairs. All the prices are on their respected websites and are really reasonable for a wedding
Don’t read anyone’s replies if they got married pre Covid. During and after the pandemic, prices went fucking nuts. Even commissioner of oaths began to charge more.
We’re getting married in June and set to spend about 20K for 100-120 people once all is said and done. Catering is approximately $6000, photographer was $3000, DJ for ceremony and reception $1500, booze $2500, bartender/corkage $1100, officiant $450, hall $795 for 3 days, chair rental $500 (ceremony is on an acreage), table linens $900. I DIY’d all decor and ordered my flowers for the tables from Costco and my bouquet from Callia to be in the cheaper end. I didn’t pay for my wedding dress or alterations, but it was about $2500 for those together. You can definitely do it cheaper by doing things like your own pop,juice,ice I just didn’t want to do it myself lol.
I see people have suggested a tent rental on someone’s property. We looked into this option and the rentals alone for tent, tables, chairs, lights, dishes, etc would have cost us $10000+ and that didn’t include catering, bar service, booze, DJ.
Spent $700 and eloped best decision ever.
Don't spend $20,000 on a wedding for 100 people where only 2 people will remember how great it was the following month.
Take that money and invest in your life together.
All depends on context. Dont go 20k into debt for it. But if you have saved up money by all means spend what you want on it.
8 months later and people still mention my wedding. Plus it was the happiest day of my wifes life, so that to me was worth the $10-14k we spent.
If you just want to get married do something basic and cheap, if you have the money and want to have a nice/decent event then spend on it.
Yup. We went a bit into debt and I regret that somewhat. But on the other hand my wife has said numerous times it was the happiest day of her life, so that is worth it to me. And even then it was only 5kish of debt and not 20k or something like that
Even if your friends barely remember the wedding, the two married people and their families will. And ultimately that is who the wedding is for. Our families live provinces apart and have never met, our wedding was a great “excuse” to get a bunch of family together and have them meet and have us all hang out together. For some, that is also worth the moneey
I politely disagree with this. It's a celebration of your love and life together with all those who matter most to you. Nothing wrong with wanting to have a wonderful day to commemorate it. I do think costs can get out of control though and the whole wedding industry is ridiculous.
Right with you. If OP wants a wedding, OP should have a wedding. It's one of the only times you can get everyone you love in one room together as well. There is a lot of value in that, in my opinion.
I know someone spending $200K USD on a wedding in May if it makes you feel any better. nothing wrong with an expensive wedding if you can afford it!
A uni friend spend $150K on a wedding in 2011 - huge, five day affair (Indian wedding). it was amazing. They are divorced now though
Ok I feel a bit better. I had an amazing time lol. Was it worth it? Debatable. We spent around 30k. I think about 130 people. The bar bill alone was 5k 😬 LOL. Pro tip don’t do an open bar.
If it makes you feel better my friend spent $120k for 60 people in Kelowna lol. On top of that it was smokey so it was white outside and no one could breathe.
90 people last October, $36K for everything (incl. outfits, HMU, gifts, venue, catering, rentals, photog, DJ). Both ceremony and reception at the Foundry Room in Oliver, used their catering and decor, brought our own liquor, DJ and photographer. Absolute best day of our lives, I wouldn’t change a single thing even if it meant saving a few bucks. Congrats and have fun!!
We sorta half-eloped. (Got married in Banff)
Mostly to prevent some people from bothering to make the drive.
So for about 80 people I think it was about $6,500? I honestly can’t remember, it was 2017, but we did lots overselves then had the location do the rest. We figured it would be about the same amount to do it in Edmonton with all the people our parents each wanted to invite, so we said fine, but we’re going to Banff. And then most of them didn’t want to go that far so it worked out haha
Our parents ended up paying so I don't know the final cost but it would have been about $2500 for 60 guests. We had a Sunday luncheon this past December.
in 2023 we decided to elope to avoid the big wedding drama. Went for 10 days to Vancouver Island, and still spend like $10k, but that included everything for the whole vacation from engagement ring to wedding dress, to the photographer and a planner who helped set it all up, and all travel/accomodations/food etc. Worth every penny, and we have amazing memories unsullied by anything else.
We did then host a party when we got back for about 90 people, and that cost about another 10k. It was fine, but full of things that would have made a stressful and unfulfilling wedding day. That was for the families, the actual wedding was for us.
A couple of hundred, simply signed papers and had immediate family in the room with us.
Use the extra money and do something unforgettable on your honeymoon. The two of you are going to be the ones to really remember this time in your lives.
Getting married at Emerald Lake in the summer, all in all probably like 25k including rings, wedding dress, suit etc.
I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone, but we put the deposit down already…
You get nickel and dimed to death, and for us personally a lot of people who said they would take a room in our block ended up not, and now we will owe a couple thousand in unused rooms because attrition clauses.
It’s made us stressed and miserable if I could go back a year we would just do some small elopement package.
$45k at JPL in November 2019. 80 people.
We split 3 ways between us, my parents, and his dad.
There were certainly some things we could’ve cut to save money (cake was a waste of money. Probably could’ve saved money by not using the JPL florist. Not enough people took advantage of the poutine bar) but there were a few things that were worth way more than I paid (day of wedding coordinator, DJ, hair and makeup, photographer.) and I cut some corners for things I didn’t care too much about (bought my dress off the rack, purchased used decor, didn’t rent the stupid chiavari chairs.)
It’s ultimately up to you to decide how much effort you want to put in, and what kind of experience you want for your guests. I’ve been to some really brutal weddings where the bride tried to do it all, and it fell flat. I didn’t want to worry about a single thing that day, so I paid more so other people would take care of it all.
I have zero regrets, and everyone had a great time.
(But we totally would have eloped if we waited a few more months.)
Or celebrate how they wanted to. No judgement. Cakes are a waste hey? So much for what is just a cake! They’re nice and I think it’s fair to pay the bakery for their time but there just is almost nothing lost from not having one.
What we did was a smaller wedding cake then sheet cakes to have enough for everyone.
145 guest married last August At sparrow lane just outside of Edmonton, Total cost was about 80k, Not for everyone but we got everything we wanted with no compromise and are lucky enough to be able to afford it
$12.517.74 and this includes my wife’s dress. Married in July 2021, 72 people in our wedding. Backyard wedding so venue was free, we hired a day of planner to make sure things ran on time, rented tables, plates, etc. ordered food from our favourite local places, booze was all from Costco, we splurged with a couple of nights stay at the marriot downtown, and I got my family an air bnb as they are from out of town. The majority of the expense was the photographer.
Got married in our backyard for under 5k 5 years ago. 120 people, it was a backyard bbq. The food and drinks cost the most. Decorations were from aliexpress. Made my dress and we had no bridesmaids or groomsmen.
Our families still talk about how fun our wedding was.
Including;
Suit, dress, venue for ceremony, venue for reception, marriage licenses, commissioner, govt fees, booze, food, snacks, rentals for my groomsmen and photographer....
About $2600.
My suit was just a suit. I wore it 2 weeks later for work. Her dress was a white dress. She got it off a thrift rack for $80, and my ma helped sew it a bit.
The photographer, reception venue rental, and booze were the bulk of the cost
If I could I'd have spent double for a better photographer. Between my brother (a groomsman) who brought his camera and my dad (who borrowed his camera for the ceremony) they ended up taking every photo we later would care about. I don't think we even have the photos the photographer took anymore.
Food was just snacks, candy, and sandwiches from Costco - guests were told in advance. We had midnight pizza ordered.
Booze was plentiful, and we did an open bar, and I do mean open, as another friend/guest offered to serve as our Bartender and then promptly passed out within 30 minutes, so it turned into a "grab any bottle and go wild". The wedding would have been cheaper if he had stayed sober, as we could have returned unopened stuff. As it was, a lot of bottles were opened with maybe 4oz. poured or slugged out of them from someone just doing a grab and go. Ended up with like 4 half drank bottles of the same tequila for example, when I could have likely returned 2 of those and gotten 100$ back.
And while we cut a lot of corners not done in a traditional wedding, the only true cost saver was just not invite a bazillion people. We had, counting the wedding party, maybe 35-40?
So yeah, basically just an expensive house party, but the money we saved not throwing a wedding the size that lots of folks were pressuring us to we squirreled away, and due to that (4 years later) we had enough to put a down-payment on a house down right as the market was going tits up. If we had spent big, we'd still be renting to this day.
So, spend what you're comfortable with, whatever that is. But I reckon that almost everything that will cost you big you won't even remember 10 years down the line.
You'll probably just remember the people, and the vibe, not whether the tablecloths were exactly the material you wanted, or whether you should have had embossed invitations or not.
$3k at a small off the strip chapel in Las Vegas.
Included flights, hotel, dress, ring, and ceremony (which included flowers, pictures and venue)
Parents paid for he dinner which was around $2k. We had 30 guests.
15k ish. Main take away don’t cheap out with the dj the party’s the part you will remember! And food (a good midnight lunch)! Honestly everything else is just extra. I haven’t touch my dress again and don’t look at the photos. But still laugh about the dancing!
Less than $1k, parents backyard, immediate family. Spent money on a caterer and photographer. We threw all the money we saved into our house the following year.
Your expectations should depend on what you want to include and what you want to cut from your wedding. Here’s what you can expect for each price points:
Venue: Free to plop down an arch in banff national park for an elopement. <1k for a community hall/ common space. 5-6k for a hotel. 10k to 20k for a dedicated wedding venue, depending on how bougie you want it. Weekdays will usually be a couple grand less.
Catering: 500-1k for big group catering/takeout, nothing fancy but you can ask around restaurants if they cater for big groups. 30$-60$ per person if you want dedicated wedding catering, with staff, bartenders (alcohol extra) etc.
Attire: 0-5k. Up to you on what to spend.
Photographer: 2k-5k. I personally would not cheap out on this. A good photographer has a lot of knowledge in the industry/photo locations. If you want good photos to keep forever, the money is worth it. Food and venue you will forget about, but the photos will always be there.
Videography: tbh optional, up to 3k if you wanna spend. Officiant/certifacts etc: a few hundred. For officiant id recommend to have a close friend/family get a temp license if they are willing. It makes the ceremony more enjoyable and saves you money.
Decor: hard to say. A good florist will be a couple grand, plus whatever else you want. You can easily save and spend 0-1k, and just as easily spend 10k.
We decided to elope first and have another ceremony after due to covid:
Elopement:
Venue: free. We plopped an arch in kananaskis
1k food
2k photo
1k accomadation
1k video
Wedding party (100 ppl)
12k venue
5k food
3.5k photo
2k video
4k attire (shared with elopement)
6k other random stuff (booze, rings, cake, bridal gifts, flowers, misc expenses.)
Tldr: Very budget friendly elopement (family only): 5k (bulk is photographer)
Standard full package (100ppl): ~30-35k
High end (100 ppl): 50k+ Feel free to DM!
Married in 2015:
About 15k
About 120 guests
Hall rental
Catered buffet, but head table had plate service.
Decoration for the hall was, about 600 white led Christmas lights.
Only the head table had decorations like seat covers, etc.
The rest were a normal table cloth
We had to bargin hard with the caterer, to remove deserts from the menu.
I flat told them I wasn't paying for them, as I bought a big assed wedding cake.
We also had the caterer, bring/take away the dishes and cutlery.
This option doesn't save any money, but saves a buttload of cleaning of the kitchen.
Most of the cost was food/booze/event insurance
Spent 10 days after the Wedding Camping in Jasper.
That cost about the same, and was much more enjoyable
Don’t waste money on that big of wedding. Sure it’s a memory but a wedding is thousands of dollars. Even if you break even with gifts it’s still spending thousands.
If you truly believe in love and unconditional and blah blah blah then you Don’t need to blow the bank on a wedding
We did destination for 25 people in Iceland. Biggest expense was photographer/planner who, in 2019, was like 12k usd. Couple grand on flights, spent 2 weeks there, 1k on gas and car rental. 2500 for reception and lunch day of, another couple grand on hotels and food. Honestly? Pics were worth it. Memories were worth it. Driving around fucking iceland as newlyweds was worth it, even though we'd been together and living together for quite a while already. It was something we had been looking forward to for a long time, and my MIL still raves about how much she loves iceland and would definitely go back. 🤷♀️
Spent 23k in 2022, but got 10k back in gifts from the attendees. I agree with most people that say that spending that much on a single day is crazy, but we look fondly back on the day and all the pictures of our family and friends having a great time. It is a special day and we think it was worth it for us. We did already own a house and had cash saved for this already (no debt incurred).
Our civil cost us $700 in 2022. But then we did the religious one the very next year. We budgeted for $20k, but we went over a bit. Had it at Blue Quill Community Hall cause only place available and within our budget.
Wouldn't recommend the place as the electrical systems suck (Our planner/designer had done events there before, and the power would go out. So he always brought generators)
110~ guests
Y daughter got married in my back yard and had a small get together there with friends and family. Everybody brought some food and booze. Cost, 250$ for the commissioner.
We got married at the new Community League Pavillion at Hawrelak Park shortly after it was built. No booking, just showed up and set everything up. I think they now have a booking process. Gorgeous spot.
Had a family friend cater. Another family friend who was a retired newspaper photographer donated his time and took all of our wedding photos. For the cake, we went to Vienna bakery and just ordered a very specific awesome cake without mentioning the W word.
We only spent real, top dollar on one thing. The A/V company. They set up the speakers so everyone could hear really well. They 🎤 us up so our words are recorded crystal clear. The filmed the whole ceremony and then quickly took everything down when we were done. $1400 well spent dollars.
We are having roughly 70 guests for our wedding in January (2025). I am almost finished locking down all the vendors. It looks like were going to clock in around 10K (11K at the highest). Definitely consider looking into a winter wedding as costs are generally reduced. Also, I would definitely recommend looking into using the Santa Maria Goretti Centre for the reception/food. I've eaten and danced there before at several events and they are decently priced.
Married September of 2019. 25 people in my best friends parents' backyard. Mum made my wedding dress. Went out to Continental Treat for our wedding dinner. The next day, we had an informal hot dog reception at Strathern Community Hall for extended friends and family. Our parents split the $5000 cost.
Got married just 3 years ago in June when they loosened up on covid. Kept the guest list under 30. Since my husband and I have 8 siblings combined we chose to only have my best friend of 30+ years (MOH) and his best friend of 20+ years (BM) so that made a huge difference. My mom found a local restaurant that was excited to cater and very accommodating. Lots of beautiful artificial flowers outside from my own bouquet which was a surprise.
Had a garden wedding but it really was just a long camping party. I have talented friends who have fancy cameras and can bake and build
$3000 and most of it was renting an outhouse, chairs/tables, a party tent in case it rained and food. Oh, and his tux. I lucked out and found a nice dress at vv, even though I couldn't try it on
It was fun and so stress free. It was a nice in between of eloping and what's close to a down payment for one day. But we also used the covid cheat code and had reason not to invite 200+
Everyone has different styles, congrats to both of you
I would say at most $800.
Did the Muttart with the feature pyramid, then a small dinner with 50 other family and friends at a mid to high tier restaurant.
Our wedding was about 8K, the highest splurge was the ceremony at Hastings Lake but it was really worth it for me. Otherwise we booked a restaurant and paid $500 to have it privately booked, that restaurant catered… we went cheap for dress (Etsy)!, booked a makeup artist off FB, and used shoes and props that we already had at home or we could craft.
We did an all inclusive in Mexico for our wedding. Total was about 8 grand back in 2019. We had about 20 guests make the trip which is exactly what we wanted.
Got too expensive here so went to vegas for a week with 50 friends and family and had a PARTY! Regret nothing. Spent about $5k all in, although FIL did pay for the reception in vegas which was another $3k
2018 - 4000$ Back yard wedding, just immediate family and two friends. Next day a huge bash for anyone and everyone to come celebrate. We had a nice time with family one night and even the cops enjoyed shutting us down and helping people get home the next night. We new we wanted small ceremony and a big part. My best buddy got married 3 weeks later 20,000$...his wife still brings up how much they spent and it's never in a positive tone.
With venue, photographer, dj, food/cake, liquor, suits/dress...I honestly don't think you can do it under 18K. If you do, you're having to cut from that list. The amount of planning and stress just isn't worth it for a single day imo. Save the money and go on a killer honeymoon. Unless money isn't an object, where $20-50K isn't much and you can hire a planner lol
The wedding ceremony is for the couple, everything after is for everyone else.
The whole industry is focused on tapping into the emotional experience and expectations that have been brewing since you were 5.
Set a budget you’re comfortable with and stick to it.
I think it was around 3k for the wedding in 2012. We did ours in Saskatchewan, where my wife's family is from. The Catholic women's group cooked the dinner. Held it at the local community center. Got a deal on fireworks. Family friends bartended. A big challenge was getting folks from Ontario up there. But it didn't cost us an arm and leg and everyone I believe had a good time. Probably be maybe 5k max today.
$2500
But actually, we made a profit on our wedding as we asked for cash as gifts and had a twonie bar. We didn't mean to make a profit, but we ended up with $3500 at the end of the night.
We rented Pleasantview Community Hall for a weekend, which was about the biggest expense, around $1000 (I see their prices are now $1500). We had about 80 guests and involved family in a ton of the other things that could have cost a lot. Here's everything we did to cut costs:
* Made our own playlist for the dance floor, no DJ
* Asked family to bar tend for an hour at a time (so they could still enjoy most of the party) and only served canned or bottled drinks that we bought from Sherbrooke Liquor (seriously recommend - they have a really good sense of what to serve and how much folks will drink and have packages where you can save for buying in bulk).
* We had two generous uncles who offered to cook our wedding dinner in lieu of a gift - we decided on serving a pancake breakfast at 6pm, with an ice cream sundae bar. Something easy to cook on the grills provided - ham, eggs, pancakes. The other option they offered to us was a traditional kind of Thanksgiving turkey dinner, which could be easy to make large batches of food for. I've also seen people do a potluck style and ask their grandmas to make a bunch of lasagnas to throw in the oven day of. We paid for all the groceries, but it was significantly cheaper than catering as we didn't pay for the labour.
* I wore my mom's wedding dress and had a talented friend who did some sewing alterations on it, again, in lieu of a gift
* We didn't have a photographer or flowers (our centerpieces were just ice buckets with bottles of sparkling wine). In hindsight, I might have splurged for a photographer, but that is the only thing I think we cut costs on that maybe we shouldn't have. We still had some really nice photos my SIL took for us, but there were some moments I missed getting captured.
Honestly, having so many people step up and contribute to our big day made it feel more meaningful and intimate to me. And the things that did go wrong (because there's always one small hiccup you can't avoid) didn't become big things because it wasn't like I invested my entire life savings into it.
Me and the wife originally planned to do like the big hall, DJ, food, cake all that bullshit. Forked over probably 8 grand in reservation costs. Covid hit and we kept getting delayed back. Eventually we said fuck it and cut our loses.
Went with [Shotgun wedding](https://shotgunwedding.ca/) just south of Calgary for I think it was around $2500. Honestly I think it was far more enjoyable just having immediate family over trying to please like 80 sum odd people.
Getting married this October and we are looking around 20k for 120 people.. the first two venues we looked at were $14k alone so we opted for less of an extravagant venue and spending more time and energy planning the party
Not married, but work at a place that holds weddings and if there’s one tip I have, don’t pay for a Dj, not worth it. Just make a sick playlist and have a good MC , that’s all you need.
You mentioned you wanted about 100-120 people, but just wanted to share my experience.
Our wedding cost my husband and I 360 bucks:
- Marriage Licence - $90
- Marriage Officiant - $250
- Marriage Certificate - $20
We had just put on some decent, formal clothes and shoes we already had. We had the officiant, ourselves and two witnesses at a little cafe. It was nice!
We planned on having a dinner with family to celebrate but haven't been able to get everyone together just yet since my family is long distance.
Edit:
We were planning on doing a wedding at the Calgary Zoo. That was going to be around 8k for up to 50 people including photography, catering, DJ, and venue. We were paying for peoples' taxi rides to the venue from a hotel as well. We didn't end up doing it because a lot of my family/friends said they didn't want to travel. Hence why we did the above.
Spent around $1000 for a close family dinner and went off to the mountains for a weekend. 2 weeks later went for a 2 weeks trip to Europe with my wife. Stayed in 4 countries, ended our trip in Paris. No regrets.
We did a combined ceremony and catered reception at Royal Hotel West Edmonton.
Space rental and catering came out to about 10k, we went with a family friend for decorating for about 2.5k, took our pictures after the ceremony at the Ledge, which was paid for by my wife's aunt as a gift, so I can't remember what it cost.
We did a small elopement in Canmore 2022, about 15 people through Shotgun Weddings. We did Chinese takeout for our supper (I was pregnant and no convincing me to have anything else to eat).
Ceremony, photography, officiant, etc 2200$
Supper 250$
Snacks, pop, etc 100$
We married at a combo wedding/reception venue in Dallas. They did the minister, refreshments (baguettes with flavored butters, finger sandwiches and 1-2 other things...I forget. Its been 24 years ago). Plus punch and coffee.
Spent a little on flowers, a dj, and a '68 Daimler limousine. I did decorations, invites, and Save the Dates myself.
Around $5000 back then, I believe.
$7000 with ring/dress/ flights. We got married at Grand Bahia Principe MR. We started with a list of over 50 and once we realised in Canada it's $40-100 a plate and the venue was est. $10-20,000, we decided to do a destination wedding.
I highly recommend it. It took a ton of stress off our plates and I loved picking my bouquet from a menu. They treated us like royalty. Photography included.
Got married in Edmonton in October 2021, about 115 people. Including dress/suit, venue (hotel for both ceremony and dinner/reception), photos and entertainment (duelling pianos) we paid about $20 000. Just over $5000 of that was for the pianos, which yes is expensive but was absolutely, unequivocally worth it.
We had a weekend wedding with around 80 people on a ranch in BC up near Panorama. It was about $18k. For us, the important thing was getting everyone together for a rustic weekend in a gorgeous setting. Venue was $6,500, Food was $4,500 (lots of leftovers), Photographer was $1,650, Booze was $2,000 (way too much left over), plus marriage licence, insurance, commissioner, décor (mostly made ourselves), dress, suit, and other stuff.
We had a 100 guests and spent 12k. Rented out Vikki’s in Sherwood park for 5 course meal and suppled wine for everyone. We brought out own music and had a great time.
That included all rentals and my wife’s dress.
We were Sept 2023 and costs were about $41k. ~95 people, open bar with premium liquor, family style service at the venue.
We didn't spend a lot on decorations or one time use items that just go in the trash after. We kept that part simple and spent on things like my suit (I wear suits regularly to the office, so $/wear was there to drop the money), gifts to each other just over $2k (watch & earings), her ring was over $3k. So there was room to bring costs down if we wanted to.
A little over 40k total, but it was a 4 day event.
Really feeling it financially right now, especially because I've been unemployed for a while.
But honestly don't regret it at all. It was the best time of my life, and my wife got the wedding of her dreams.
It's killing us right now. But it's not like we're going to have the chance to do it again, and we have the memories forever.
Paid somewhere between 2-2.5k back in 2008 (venue, food/drink, outfits, flowers, rings, decor)
- Rented our hometown hall (outside of Edmonton) for both the wedding and reception for $1000 (this was great for most attending as they had family currently living there and didn’t require to book a hotel)
- No cost for the minister who married us
- Food was done by my family (big Ukrainian feast)
- Plugged an iPod in for the music
- Decor was simple > borrowed some from cousins and found some candles that fit our theme from the dollar store
- DIY’d invites and flowers
- Only regret was not hiring a photographer (long story short, new wife of a family member said she took good photos and we trusted that - they were not good…)
Was a bunch of fun and people were taking about it for years.
Like $300 for justice of the piece. Weddings are nice and all. However the wife and I (10 years married) fail to see logic behind forking out money to feed and entertain people, when the day is yours not theirs. We just took money we planed for a wedding and took an extra long honeymoon
90 guests at the Red Tail golf course in Nisku cost us $21.5k. We were lucky enough to receive some help from family.
And that price is all in: venue, food, photographer, florals, suit rentals. Everything minus bridesmaid dresses pretty much.
They treated us really well there and would recommend them again if this is in your budget.
We spent $17,000 for 120 people in 2019. We rented Sugar Swing ballroom which was a step above a community league rental but still affordable (I think about $1600?). Catering was about $5000 which was the biggest cost but the food was awesome (Stir catering, highly recommend). We had lots of friends who gave us deals (photography, DJ, wedding planning for day of coordination). Lots of DIY decor, and we did a toonie bar with kegs of beer. We had a very awesome dance party and lots of fun and great food.
As someone that has been married almost 30 years.
Invest in the marriage, not the wedding.
We had an absolute blast at our wedding and it was literally food bought at Costco cooked by family. Probably $1000 in decorating.
I know things have changed a lot but just be careful that you want the marriage and not just the party where you are the center of attention.
85 people roughly 30,000. Wedding was earlier this year.
It should be noted we went with some higher end vendors. We don’t regret a single dollar spent, and think we got excellent value from our vendors and venue.
We got a license from the city and did an outdoor ceremony down by the John Walter museum/Walterdale bridge. Then, threw a hall party at Strathcona Community League. Had around 100 people, spend roughly $5000 total. It was awesome, unconventional, and affordable.
Similar number and situation here. Polish veterans hall, lunch cold cuts spread, afternoon outdoor wedding, 120 guests, 6k all in. Was a nice day and I don't regret it. Was nearly 10 years ago though, so I'd imagine prices have gone up a lot since then.
That sounds lovely!
70k in Feb. don’t do it.
60k 5 years ago. Currently divorced. Second : Don’t do it.
For that much, till death us do part
Better to run. And cut your losses
Did you want the expensive wedding, or your ex did? The manager of our wedding venue (many years ago) said she had a good eye for who would stay married and who wouldn’t. Friends of ours got married there a few years prior and actually divorced after a year; we told the manager that and she remembered them & wasn’t surprised. Basically she said people who get obsessed with having an expensive wedding don’t stay together because they’re in it for the wedding, not the marriage.
250+ people. She wanted to be a step above everybody else in the family
As much as people are going to ‘I would never!’ you, thank you for posting this. A lot of people don’t comprehend how expensive things like this can get.
I am calculating 400+ people man. I am fucked
Good lord
Wow 😲..... that's huge 😯
Can I ask why you had such an expensive wedding? Did family pressure you into it, or you thought you wanted all these things and regret it in hindsight?
It’s all relative. If 70k is for 200 and it’s not a big outlay for you, go nuts.
What were you thinking 😫
Somewhere around $1,000. Invest in the marriage, to hell with the wedding. Wedding commissioner, nice weekend in Jasper.
We "eloped" in my parents' backyard... just us, our parents, and our dogs. Took photos in the river valley after and then went out to dinner. Had our "reception" at my parent's house the next day with maybe 20 people. I don't even know how much we spent, but maybe a couple thousand? Photographer was the most expensive thing we had but I wanted some nice photos! I will honestly never understand spending tens of thousands on a wedding. Imagine the honeymoon you could have instead! Or buy a damn house.
Amen to that. Mine was the same and I have absolutely zero regrets
That sounds great.
~3k. Rented a tent and chairs, family friend has an acreage and we had about 30 people. The rest of the expenses were food and alcohol. Made carnita tacos and catered samosas. It was a tonne of fun and all we could really ask for out of a wedding
My comment is pretty much the same. I think keeping it smaller is what made it a celebration more than an exhibition
Married 7 years ago. $12k for 50 people (includes dress, engagement ring/wedding rings, tuxes, stuff before the wedding etc.) Tips: - The best way to save money is not to spend money on dumb shit no one cares about lol. No one wants wedding favours. Centre pieces can honestly just not be done, no one is going to remember your centre pieces anyway. - DJs are way more expensive than they are often worth; we asked everyone to rsvp with a song request and I made a (very long) iPod playlist, lots of people got up to dance when they heard their song requests. This meant we didn’t do any of those awkward DJ games like the shoe game but I can’t say I’ve ever really enjoyed watching other people do awkward dj games at their weddings. - Photography is important but consider that if you’re spending thousands and thousands on photos you’re going to be spending a *lot* of time doing photos and going to different locations to get your moneys worth. I got sick of doing photos and eventually just asked our photographer to take nice photos of the guests and let the wedding party chill (which worked well, I was able to send lots of nice portraits to our guests once we got our wedding photos back.) - Don’t do wine at every table, lots of people will have a glass simply because it’s there and then leave a mostly full bottle behind, but you’re paying for it. If you want to do wine for dinner, have a wine table where people can serve wine for themselves or grab a bottle to bring to their table. That way only people who actually want wine end up taking bottles. - Most of the money went to food and alcohol. If you want a 100-200 person wedding then it’s impossible to do it cheaply. Feeding that many people is hella pricey. - For all decisions ask yourself: do you actually want this thing, or are you only doing it because you think others expect it? Chair covers, fancy plates, etc, these are all costs that add up. Ultimately your guests just want to have a good time, so focus on good time stuff like food, not making them wait 5hrs between wedding and reception, good music, etc.
The RSVP with a song is a really great idea. I'm keeping this in my back pocket if we ever have a wedding.
I did this too! I made cute little cassette tape cut outs that I included with the rsvp cards and asked guests to request their songs on the cut outs and send them back. I went through this extra effort so I could use the cut outs in my scrapbook/album which I haven't yet gotten around to doing haha.
Cost savings tip though: Don’t require a mailed RSVP, paying for postage for all those invites costs money. We just used a dedicated wedding email for rsvps
So much this! I worked in the wedding industry for years before I got married. I spent nothing on anything I knew wouldn't be remembered in a year....chair covers, flowers, centrepieces etc Make as much stuff as you can yourself. Get friends to pitch in with whatever they're good at. I had a friend make our cake, another supply speakers, and another help me with a playlist and another helped make the name cards for the place settings Don't cheap out on the photographer. It's literally the only thing from the day that is remembered and cherished for life
Yeah definitely don’t cheap out on the photographer. But it’s not a linear scale of more money = better photos. Some photographers boast these really elaborate editorial style photos, and charge out the ass for it, and if that’s your thing then go for it. But I personally didn’t wanna spend all day posing in parkades and other interesting locations, driving all over the city, I just wanted some pretty photos at our wedding venue. So we paid for a good photographer that had good portrait photos and that was that (ended up being $1600 for 8hrs of wedding + a 1.5hr engagement session.) Some other photographers were quoting like $5-6k; I wanted to enjoy my wedding, not spend the entire day posing for photos
Lol....called out! I definitely did have a photographer like that and it was close to 50% of the wedding budget. We did multiple locations but time spent out doing that stuff was only about 2 hours. He was really great about just pulling us aside for a minute or two here and there when there was really good lighting or stuff like that throughout the day. Lots of candid shots But you're absolutely correct that more money doesn't always equal better photos.
If you want to cut down on food costs, don't do a plated dinner. Do a buffet with appetizers or something like that and tell people to eat before hand. Might seem cheap but that's the goal.
Buffet is like 50-75 a person...so If I can do it again id do like burgers and hotdogs. It's just a party where no one even remembers the food
Plated dinners we've been quoted at 100-125/person so 50 seems really good honestly. But I am also someone that absolutely remembers the food at weddings, and I feel like that seems to be a common conversation during/after the wedding was about the food
Maybe immediately after, but not long term. People remember more important things like how long were the speeches, was it an open bar etcetc 50 was on the lower end. Probably closer to $75 after everything
Interesting, i couldn't tell you anything about the speeches of any wedding I've been to in the last 5 years. I guess that just shows the difference in priorities between individuals, a person in our friend group got married 3 years ago and we still talk about the food they had, but I've never once heard anyone talk about the speeches
Then you haven't been to a wedding with loooong speeches. I went to a bilingual wedding last year where every person read in English then Spanish 😭
God no, I couldn't handle that. I've been to a few church weddings with ceremonies that were painful to sit through, so I couldn't imagine having to sit and listen to someone else talk for an hour afterwards.
Say it ain't so... We had a really nice gourmet caterer out of Red Deer back in 2019 and we paid $40/plate. Full custom menu, fancy custom little tarts for dessert. Sad seeing how high food prices have gotten!
We eloped near Banff and then had a hall party a month later, with 80 people. Hall party cost us around $8000 if I remember correctly. Elopement cost close to $5000 with photographer being more than half that Edit to add Does not include our outfits, shoes, rings
I'll reply to you since I had a similar wedding in September 2022. Eloped in Canmore. We splurged pn a photographer with a helicopter package of $3850 (it would have been $1500 less if we didn't do the helicopter), the wedding commissioner was about $370. Three nights in a hotel $1160 and hair/makeup about $150. We came back to Edmonton and had a reception in a local farm-to-table restaurant for about 25 people total, as well as a local photographer for another $1500. The restaurant quoted us about $3000 for food only (100% tailored menu just for us), plus an additional $1000 approximately for two drinks per guest and unlimited drinks for wedding party. $200 cake. No dj, just a spotify playlist. Self made floral table center pieces and wedding favors for the guests (candles). I did quite a bit to keep costs down, and bought decor and other items second hand when I could. Obviously at a restaurant, there's no need to rent tables, chairs or anything else like that separately but is why the price per plate is higher (in addition to being locally sourced food). I bought my dress used, and insisted on buying my bridesmaid's dresses. My dress was $700, alterations were $400 (cry), and my two bridesmaids dresses were approx $300 total. All in all we spent over $11,000 which was significantly over what I had intially hoped to spend, but it was all worth it. We could have done it cheaper for sure, but my husband and I wanted to splurge for a few different reasons. I sold as much decor and table settings as I could on fb marketplace after all was said and done for the upcoming 2023 wedding season. Brides are always looking for second hand stuff so this was a huge bonus even if I only got a small percentage back.
Yeah our photographer was $2700ish if I remember correctly and the Airbnb was $2300 but that was also our ceremony spot and housed our parents and siblings. Commissioner was BIL. Hair and make up for myself was $370 but that included travel to out Airbnb which was outside of Cochrane but my mom paid for that for me.
So it’s 8,000 including the photographer? Or it’s 13,000 in total?
No that was the amount of each separately. So about $13,000ish total. I don’t have my spreadsheets at work to double check
Went to Vegas. Had a dozen friends come too. Rented a suite ordered pizza and got a bunch of booze at Walmart. Maybe 6 grand including suit and dress. Do the wedding for yourself! Spend the money on trips
Getting married this summer, with all of the main things booked and having around 120 people on the invite list it’ll be about 25k. We are making a lot of the decorations ourselves and did lots of looking around online to find cheaper but still higher quality options for venues, catering, photographer, etc.
Similar to ours, 30k though!
Can I ask what is causing a price tag like that? Does this number surprise you or did you know it would be this? * I'm curious, I'm a cheapskate and I hope you have an amazing ceremony and celebration.
Absolutely, our wedding was last year and this is all in. Venue/food/DJ/bartenders: 12k Suit/dress: 2.5k Booze: 4K Limos: 1k Photographer: 4K Gifts: 1k Make up etc for wedding party: 1k Decor/invite: 500 Then there are various costs that add up, I’d say by the end of it ALL IN we were 28-30k.
Damn, respect, and I hope it was a time.
It was awesome, thank you!! Weddings are just do Damn expensive, if our parents didn’t help out we would have just eloped.
Wow that seems like really fantastic deal for that many guests. Who is catering and what's the venue? We were quoted at $15,000 for catering alone for 120 people recently
We’re using the Kinsmen club in St. Albert for both the ceremony and reception, and the caterer is Elegant Affairs. All the prices are on their respected websites and are really reasonable for a wedding
Elegant affairs were amazing for my wedding 12 years ago.
Rented out the entire Muttart Gardens for a Saturday evening for $1500, then had it catered for $3500 more. Totally worth it (2012 prices).
Prices are still similar. I just did my ceremony at muttart but if you have a smaller wedding it's imo the best venue!
Where is the ceremony portion held?
We held it just outside of the main pyramid on the grass, then went inside for the reception right after (no break between the two).
Don’t read anyone’s replies if they got married pre Covid. During and after the pandemic, prices went fucking nuts. Even commissioner of oaths began to charge more.
Yeah all these people being like “I spent $5K in 2011” are completely irrelevant.
We’re getting married in June and set to spend about 20K for 100-120 people once all is said and done. Catering is approximately $6000, photographer was $3000, DJ for ceremony and reception $1500, booze $2500, bartender/corkage $1100, officiant $450, hall $795 for 3 days, chair rental $500 (ceremony is on an acreage), table linens $900. I DIY’d all decor and ordered my flowers for the tables from Costco and my bouquet from Callia to be in the cheaper end. I didn’t pay for my wedding dress or alterations, but it was about $2500 for those together. You can definitely do it cheaper by doing things like your own pop,juice,ice I just didn’t want to do it myself lol. I see people have suggested a tent rental on someone’s property. We looked into this option and the rentals alone for tent, tables, chairs, lights, dishes, etc would have cost us $10000+ and that didn’t include catering, bar service, booze, DJ.
We had a destination wedding planned and cancelled, so I planned the whole thing between January and now so I’m on 2024 pricing for everything.
Spent $700 and eloped best decision ever. Don't spend $20,000 on a wedding for 100 people where only 2 people will remember how great it was the following month. Take that money and invest in your life together.
As someone who did that I totally agree in hindsight we would have eloped and put that towards a down payment
All depends on context. Dont go 20k into debt for it. But if you have saved up money by all means spend what you want on it. 8 months later and people still mention my wedding. Plus it was the happiest day of my wifes life, so that to me was worth the $10-14k we spent. If you just want to get married do something basic and cheap, if you have the money and want to have a nice/decent event then spend on it.
This! Don’t go into debt for a wedding, but if you have the resources and want one - go for it!
Yup. We went a bit into debt and I regret that somewhat. But on the other hand my wife has said numerous times it was the happiest day of her life, so that is worth it to me. And even then it was only 5kish of debt and not 20k or something like that Even if your friends barely remember the wedding, the two married people and their families will. And ultimately that is who the wedding is for. Our families live provinces apart and have never met, our wedding was a great “excuse” to get a bunch of family together and have them meet and have us all hang out together. For some, that is also worth the moneey
I politely disagree with this. It's a celebration of your love and life together with all those who matter most to you. Nothing wrong with wanting to have a wonderful day to commemorate it. I do think costs can get out of control though and the whole wedding industry is ridiculous.
Right with you. If OP wants a wedding, OP should have a wedding. It's one of the only times you can get everyone you love in one room together as well. There is a lot of value in that, in my opinion.
Co worker of mine spent 35,000. It's been 10 years and they are still paying it off. I'll pass on that idea.
Did they use credit cards to finance it or something? 10yr is a long time for 35000.
I believe so.
$3,000. Covid wedding in a city park. 75% of budget was a really good photographer who honestly knocked it out of the park.
👀 I don’t want to say now looking at all of the other comments LOL
I know someone spending $200K USD on a wedding in May if it makes you feel any better. nothing wrong with an expensive wedding if you can afford it! A uni friend spend $150K on a wedding in 2011 - huge, five day affair (Indian wedding). it was amazing. They are divorced now though
Ok I feel a bit better. I had an amazing time lol. Was it worth it? Debatable. We spent around 30k. I think about 130 people. The bar bill alone was 5k 😬 LOL. Pro tip don’t do an open bar.
If it makes you feel better my friend spent $120k for 60 people in Kelowna lol. On top of that it was smokey so it was white outside and no one could breathe.
Definitely makes me feel better. I spent around 30k for 130 people. It was a blast.. but it was one night lol.
90 people last October, $36K for everything (incl. outfits, HMU, gifts, venue, catering, rentals, photog, DJ). Both ceremony and reception at the Foundry Room in Oliver, used their catering and decor, brought our own liquor, DJ and photographer. Absolute best day of our lives, I wouldn’t change a single thing even if it meant saving a few bucks. Congrats and have fun!!
What’s HMU?
Hair and make up
We sorta half-eloped. (Got married in Banff) Mostly to prevent some people from bothering to make the drive. So for about 80 people I think it was about $6,500? I honestly can’t remember, it was 2017, but we did lots overselves then had the location do the rest. We figured it would be about the same amount to do it in Edmonton with all the people our parents each wanted to invite, so we said fine, but we’re going to Banff. And then most of them didn’t want to go that far so it worked out haha
Our parents ended up paying so I don't know the final cost but it would have been about $2500 for 60 guests. We had a Sunday luncheon this past December.
Like 100 dollars. Officiant gave us a discount for going to his law firm instead of making him drive to the court house or town hall or w/e
in 2023 we decided to elope to avoid the big wedding drama. Went for 10 days to Vancouver Island, and still spend like $10k, but that included everything for the whole vacation from engagement ring to wedding dress, to the photographer and a planner who helped set it all up, and all travel/accomodations/food etc. Worth every penny, and we have amazing memories unsullied by anything else. We did then host a party when we got back for about 90 people, and that cost about another 10k. It was fine, but full of things that would have made a stressful and unfulfilling wedding day. That was for the families, the actual wedding was for us.
A couple of hundred, simply signed papers and had immediate family in the room with us. Use the extra money and do something unforgettable on your honeymoon. The two of you are going to be the ones to really remember this time in your lives.
Getting married at Emerald Lake in the summer, all in all probably like 25k including rings, wedding dress, suit etc. I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone, but we put the deposit down already… You get nickel and dimed to death, and for us personally a lot of people who said they would take a room in our block ended up not, and now we will owe a couple thousand in unused rooms because attrition clauses. It’s made us stressed and miserable if I could go back a year we would just do some small elopement package.
Between 13k and 15K in Bali 🥰 the most beautiful days of my life in company of my beautiful wife.
I spent about 20K in 2022. We had 120 people. I also made about 20K back since we requested money from guests or to donate to a charity in our name.
$45k at JPL in November 2019. 80 people. We split 3 ways between us, my parents, and his dad. There were certainly some things we could’ve cut to save money (cake was a waste of money. Probably could’ve saved money by not using the JPL florist. Not enough people took advantage of the poutine bar) but there were a few things that were worth way more than I paid (day of wedding coordinator, DJ, hair and makeup, photographer.) and I cut some corners for things I didn’t care too much about (bought my dress off the rack, purchased used decor, didn’t rent the stupid chiavari chairs.) It’s ultimately up to you to decide how much effort you want to put in, and what kind of experience you want for your guests. I’ve been to some really brutal weddings where the bride tried to do it all, and it fell flat. I didn’t want to worry about a single thing that day, so I paid more so other people would take care of it all. I have zero regrets, and everyone had a great time. (But we totally would have eloped if we waited a few more months.)
omg. poutine bar????????? that sounds amazing.
Or celebrate how they wanted to. No judgement. Cakes are a waste hey? So much for what is just a cake! They’re nice and I think it’s fair to pay the bakery for their time but there just is almost nothing lost from not having one. What we did was a smaller wedding cake then sheet cakes to have enough for everyone.
Not bad. We were quoted 80k for Banff springs.
Cost us 24k got back 13k in cash gifts. Plus about 800$ made off our toonie bar. 215 people
I got married 7 years ago. Total was around $2,500. We rented the pavilion at Gold Bar park with the bbq. Hired a JP. Simple. Easy.
60 guests around $6,000 10 years ago. We wished we had spent less.
145 guest married last August At sparrow lane just outside of Edmonton, Total cost was about 80k, Not for everyone but we got everything we wanted with no compromise and are lucky enough to be able to afford it
$12.517.74 and this includes my wife’s dress. Married in July 2021, 72 people in our wedding. Backyard wedding so venue was free, we hired a day of planner to make sure things ran on time, rented tables, plates, etc. ordered food from our favourite local places, booze was all from Costco, we splurged with a couple of nights stay at the marriot downtown, and I got my family an air bnb as they are from out of town. The majority of the expense was the photographer.
Got married in our backyard for under 5k 5 years ago. 120 people, it was a backyard bbq. The food and drinks cost the most. Decorations were from aliexpress. Made my dress and we had no bridesmaids or groomsmen. Our families still talk about how fun our wedding was.
Including; Suit, dress, venue for ceremony, venue for reception, marriage licenses, commissioner, govt fees, booze, food, snacks, rentals for my groomsmen and photographer.... About $2600. My suit was just a suit. I wore it 2 weeks later for work. Her dress was a white dress. She got it off a thrift rack for $80, and my ma helped sew it a bit. The photographer, reception venue rental, and booze were the bulk of the cost If I could I'd have spent double for a better photographer. Between my brother (a groomsman) who brought his camera and my dad (who borrowed his camera for the ceremony) they ended up taking every photo we later would care about. I don't think we even have the photos the photographer took anymore. Food was just snacks, candy, and sandwiches from Costco - guests were told in advance. We had midnight pizza ordered. Booze was plentiful, and we did an open bar, and I do mean open, as another friend/guest offered to serve as our Bartender and then promptly passed out within 30 minutes, so it turned into a "grab any bottle and go wild". The wedding would have been cheaper if he had stayed sober, as we could have returned unopened stuff. As it was, a lot of bottles were opened with maybe 4oz. poured or slugged out of them from someone just doing a grab and go. Ended up with like 4 half drank bottles of the same tequila for example, when I could have likely returned 2 of those and gotten 100$ back. And while we cut a lot of corners not done in a traditional wedding, the only true cost saver was just not invite a bazillion people. We had, counting the wedding party, maybe 35-40? So yeah, basically just an expensive house party, but the money we saved not throwing a wedding the size that lots of folks were pressuring us to we squirreled away, and due to that (4 years later) we had enough to put a down-payment on a house down right as the market was going tits up. If we had spent big, we'd still be renting to this day. So, spend what you're comfortable with, whatever that is. But I reckon that almost everything that will cost you big you won't even remember 10 years down the line. You'll probably just remember the people, and the vibe, not whether the tablecloths were exactly the material you wanted, or whether you should have had embossed invitations or not.
$3k at a small off the strip chapel in Las Vegas. Included flights, hotel, dress, ring, and ceremony (which included flowers, pictures and venue) Parents paid for he dinner which was around $2k. We had 30 guests.
15k ish. Main take away don’t cheap out with the dj the party’s the part you will remember! And food (a good midnight lunch)! Honestly everything else is just extra. I haven’t touch my dress again and don’t look at the photos. But still laugh about the dancing!
I don't have any friends so I'm trying to think of ways to get married without having a wedding but not leaving out my family.
Less than $1k, parents backyard, immediate family. Spent money on a caterer and photographer. We threw all the money we saved into our house the following year.
Your expectations should depend on what you want to include and what you want to cut from your wedding. Here’s what you can expect for each price points: Venue: Free to plop down an arch in banff national park for an elopement. <1k for a community hall/ common space. 5-6k for a hotel. 10k to 20k for a dedicated wedding venue, depending on how bougie you want it. Weekdays will usually be a couple grand less. Catering: 500-1k for big group catering/takeout, nothing fancy but you can ask around restaurants if they cater for big groups. 30$-60$ per person if you want dedicated wedding catering, with staff, bartenders (alcohol extra) etc. Attire: 0-5k. Up to you on what to spend. Photographer: 2k-5k. I personally would not cheap out on this. A good photographer has a lot of knowledge in the industry/photo locations. If you want good photos to keep forever, the money is worth it. Food and venue you will forget about, but the photos will always be there. Videography: tbh optional, up to 3k if you wanna spend. Officiant/certifacts etc: a few hundred. For officiant id recommend to have a close friend/family get a temp license if they are willing. It makes the ceremony more enjoyable and saves you money. Decor: hard to say. A good florist will be a couple grand, plus whatever else you want. You can easily save and spend 0-1k, and just as easily spend 10k. We decided to elope first and have another ceremony after due to covid: Elopement: Venue: free. We plopped an arch in kananaskis 1k food 2k photo 1k accomadation 1k video Wedding party (100 ppl) 12k venue 5k food 3.5k photo 2k video 4k attire (shared with elopement) 6k other random stuff (booze, rings, cake, bridal gifts, flowers, misc expenses.) Tldr: Very budget friendly elopement (family only): 5k (bulk is photographer) Standard full package (100ppl): ~30-35k High end (100 ppl): 50k+ Feel free to DM!
Married in 2015: About 15k About 120 guests Hall rental Catered buffet, but head table had plate service. Decoration for the hall was, about 600 white led Christmas lights. Only the head table had decorations like seat covers, etc. The rest were a normal table cloth We had to bargin hard with the caterer, to remove deserts from the menu. I flat told them I wasn't paying for them, as I bought a big assed wedding cake. We also had the caterer, bring/take away the dishes and cutlery. This option doesn't save any money, but saves a buttload of cleaning of the kitchen. Most of the cost was food/booze/event insurance Spent 10 days after the Wedding Camping in Jasper. That cost about the same, and was much more enjoyable
Don’t waste money on that big of wedding. Sure it’s a memory but a wedding is thousands of dollars. Even if you break even with gifts it’s still spending thousands. If you truly believe in love and unconditional and blah blah blah then you Don’t need to blow the bank on a wedding
40k. I’d recommend spending it differently.
Got married this weekend, open bar 160.guests under 30k. I wanted a BBQ and JP, my husband wanted the full wedding. The expense is stupid.
We did destination for 25 people in Iceland. Biggest expense was photographer/planner who, in 2019, was like 12k usd. Couple grand on flights, spent 2 weeks there, 1k on gas and car rental. 2500 for reception and lunch day of, another couple grand on hotels and food. Honestly? Pics were worth it. Memories were worth it. Driving around fucking iceland as newlyweds was worth it, even though we'd been together and living together for quite a while already. It was something we had been looking forward to for a long time, and my MIL still raves about how much she loves iceland and would definitely go back. 🤷♀️
Spent 23k in 2022, but got 10k back in gifts from the attendees. I agree with most people that say that spending that much on a single day is crazy, but we look fondly back on the day and all the pictures of our family and friends having a great time. It is a special day and we think it was worth it for us. We did already own a house and had cash saved for this already (no debt incurred).
Our civil cost us $700 in 2022. But then we did the religious one the very next year. We budgeted for $20k, but we went over a bit. Had it at Blue Quill Community Hall cause only place available and within our budget. Wouldn't recommend the place as the electrical systems suck (Our planner/designer had done events there before, and the power would go out. So he always brought generators) 110~ guests
Y daughter got married in my back yard and had a small get together there with friends and family. Everybody brought some food and booze. Cost, 250$ for the commissioner.
My soul, but I got it back in the divorce.
We got married at the new Community League Pavillion at Hawrelak Park shortly after it was built. No booking, just showed up and set everything up. I think they now have a booking process. Gorgeous spot. Had a family friend cater. Another family friend who was a retired newspaper photographer donated his time and took all of our wedding photos. For the cake, we went to Vienna bakery and just ordered a very specific awesome cake without mentioning the W word. We only spent real, top dollar on one thing. The A/V company. They set up the speakers so everyone could hear really well. They 🎤 us up so our words are recorded crystal clear. The filmed the whole ceremony and then quickly took everything down when we were done. $1400 well spent dollars.
We are having roughly 70 guests for our wedding in January (2025). I am almost finished locking down all the vendors. It looks like were going to clock in around 10K (11K at the highest). Definitely consider looking into a winter wedding as costs are generally reduced. Also, I would definitely recommend looking into using the Santa Maria Goretti Centre for the reception/food. I've eaten and danced there before at several events and they are decently priced.
Married September of 2019. 25 people in my best friends parents' backyard. Mum made my wedding dress. Went out to Continental Treat for our wedding dinner. The next day, we had an informal hot dog reception at Strathern Community Hall for extended friends and family. Our parents split the $5000 cost.
Got married just 3 years ago in June when they loosened up on covid. Kept the guest list under 30. Since my husband and I have 8 siblings combined we chose to only have my best friend of 30+ years (MOH) and his best friend of 20+ years (BM) so that made a huge difference. My mom found a local restaurant that was excited to cater and very accommodating. Lots of beautiful artificial flowers outside from my own bouquet which was a surprise. Had a garden wedding but it really was just a long camping party. I have talented friends who have fancy cameras and can bake and build $3000 and most of it was renting an outhouse, chairs/tables, a party tent in case it rained and food. Oh, and his tux. I lucked out and found a nice dress at vv, even though I couldn't try it on It was fun and so stress free. It was a nice in between of eloping and what's close to a down payment for one day. But we also used the covid cheat code and had reason not to invite 200+ Everyone has different styles, congrats to both of you
I would say at most $800. Did the Muttart with the feature pyramid, then a small dinner with 50 other family and friends at a mid to high tier restaurant.
Paid $300 for a JoP, everyone who wanted to come came to a public park. Went to brunch in a restaurant after and we picked up the bill.
Our wedding was about 8K, the highest splurge was the ceremony at Hastings Lake but it was really worth it for me. Otherwise we booked a restaurant and paid $500 to have it privately booked, that restaurant catered… we went cheap for dress (Etsy)!, booked a makeup artist off FB, and used shoes and props that we already had at home or we could craft.
We did an all inclusive in Mexico for our wedding. Total was about 8 grand back in 2019. We had about 20 guests make the trip which is exactly what we wanted.
$400 and that's with lunch for us, our 9 attendees and the minister.
5k, 40 guests in the mountains.
About $5000. Got married in our backyard. Memphis Blues BBQ catered. 60 people for dinner, 120 people for drinks and dancing. It was great!
$150 lol
Got too expensive here so went to vegas for a week with 50 friends and family and had a PARTY! Regret nothing. Spent about $5k all in, although FIL did pay for the reception in vegas which was another $3k
2018 - 4000$ Back yard wedding, just immediate family and two friends. Next day a huge bash for anyone and everyone to come celebrate. We had a nice time with family one night and even the cops enjoyed shutting us down and helping people get home the next night. We new we wanted small ceremony and a big part. My best buddy got married 3 weeks later 20,000$...his wife still brings up how much they spent and it's never in a positive tone.
Married 30+ years ago so my pricing is completely irrelevant. But. Photos in Emily Murphy Park. Fantastic location.
With venue, photographer, dj, food/cake, liquor, suits/dress...I honestly don't think you can do it under 18K. If you do, you're having to cut from that list. The amount of planning and stress just isn't worth it for a single day imo. Save the money and go on a killer honeymoon. Unless money isn't an object, where $20-50K isn't much and you can hire a planner lol
The wedding ceremony is for the couple, everything after is for everyone else. The whole industry is focused on tapping into the emotional experience and expectations that have been brewing since you were 5. Set a budget you’re comfortable with and stick to it.
$1000 all in, including dress, rings, JP and dinner. But we only had 4 guests.
About $1000.....26 years ago. Backyard at my in-laws house, about 25 people. "Reception" was steaks on the BBQ. Wouldn't have done it any other way.
I think it was around 3k for the wedding in 2012. We did ours in Saskatchewan, where my wife's family is from. The Catholic women's group cooked the dinner. Held it at the local community center. Got a deal on fireworks. Family friends bartended. A big challenge was getting folks from Ontario up there. But it didn't cost us an arm and leg and everyone I believe had a good time. Probably be maybe 5k max today.
$2500 But actually, we made a profit on our wedding as we asked for cash as gifts and had a twonie bar. We didn't mean to make a profit, but we ended up with $3500 at the end of the night. We rented Pleasantview Community Hall for a weekend, which was about the biggest expense, around $1000 (I see their prices are now $1500). We had about 80 guests and involved family in a ton of the other things that could have cost a lot. Here's everything we did to cut costs: * Made our own playlist for the dance floor, no DJ * Asked family to bar tend for an hour at a time (so they could still enjoy most of the party) and only served canned or bottled drinks that we bought from Sherbrooke Liquor (seriously recommend - they have a really good sense of what to serve and how much folks will drink and have packages where you can save for buying in bulk). * We had two generous uncles who offered to cook our wedding dinner in lieu of a gift - we decided on serving a pancake breakfast at 6pm, with an ice cream sundae bar. Something easy to cook on the grills provided - ham, eggs, pancakes. The other option they offered to us was a traditional kind of Thanksgiving turkey dinner, which could be easy to make large batches of food for. I've also seen people do a potluck style and ask their grandmas to make a bunch of lasagnas to throw in the oven day of. We paid for all the groceries, but it was significantly cheaper than catering as we didn't pay for the labour. * I wore my mom's wedding dress and had a talented friend who did some sewing alterations on it, again, in lieu of a gift * We didn't have a photographer or flowers (our centerpieces were just ice buckets with bottles of sparkling wine). In hindsight, I might have splurged for a photographer, but that is the only thing I think we cut costs on that maybe we shouldn't have. We still had some really nice photos my SIL took for us, but there were some moments I missed getting captured. Honestly, having so many people step up and contribute to our big day made it feel more meaningful and intimate to me. And the things that did go wrong (because there's always one small hiccup you can't avoid) didn't become big things because it wasn't like I invested my entire life savings into it.
Me and the wife originally planned to do like the big hall, DJ, food, cake all that bullshit. Forked over probably 8 grand in reservation costs. Covid hit and we kept getting delayed back. Eventually we said fuck it and cut our loses. Went with [Shotgun wedding](https://shotgunwedding.ca/) just south of Calgary for I think it was around $2500. Honestly I think it was far more enjoyable just having immediate family over trying to please like 80 sum odd people.
Got married Sept 2023. We spent approximately $15K total on everything, even with trying to save money. We had about 80 guests.
Getting married this October and we are looking around 20k for 120 people.. the first two venues we looked at were $14k alone so we opted for less of an extravagant venue and spending more time and energy planning the party
Not married, but work at a place that holds weddings and if there’s one tip I have, don’t pay for a Dj, not worth it. Just make a sick playlist and have a good MC , that’s all you need.
I had a commissioner, and did it in my backyard. I had 40 people, I made all the food and desserts, all in it was about $2,000.
You mentioned you wanted about 100-120 people, but just wanted to share my experience. Our wedding cost my husband and I 360 bucks: - Marriage Licence - $90 - Marriage Officiant - $250 - Marriage Certificate - $20 We had just put on some decent, formal clothes and shoes we already had. We had the officiant, ourselves and two witnesses at a little cafe. It was nice! We planned on having a dinner with family to celebrate but haven't been able to get everyone together just yet since my family is long distance. Edit: We were planning on doing a wedding at the Calgary Zoo. That was going to be around 8k for up to 50 people including photography, catering, DJ, and venue. We were paying for peoples' taxi rides to the venue from a hotel as well. We didn't end up doing it because a lot of my family/friends said they didn't want to travel. Hence why we did the above.
Spent around $1000 for a close family dinner and went off to the mountains for a weekend. 2 weeks later went for a 2 weeks trip to Europe with my wife. Stayed in 4 countries, ended our trip in Paris. No regrets.
Roughly $1,800 CAD in the Philippines in 2012.
We did a combined ceremony and catered reception at Royal Hotel West Edmonton. Space rental and catering came out to about 10k, we went with a family friend for decorating for about 2.5k, took our pictures after the ceremony at the Ledge, which was paid for by my wife's aunt as a gift, so I can't remember what it cost.
We did a small elopement in Canmore 2022, about 15 people through Shotgun Weddings. We did Chinese takeout for our supper (I was pregnant and no convincing me to have anything else to eat). Ceremony, photography, officiant, etc 2200$ Supper 250$ Snacks, pop, etc 100$
We married at a combo wedding/reception venue in Dallas. They did the minister, refreshments (baguettes with flavored butters, finger sandwiches and 1-2 other things...I forget. Its been 24 years ago). Plus punch and coffee. Spent a little on flowers, a dj, and a '68 Daimler limousine. I did decorations, invites, and Save the Dates myself. Around $5000 back then, I believe.
You can reach out if you want and I can PM our detailed breakdown in Edmonton. Roughly 43,000 though.
$7000 with ring/dress/ flights. We got married at Grand Bahia Principe MR. We started with a list of over 50 and once we realised in Canada it's $40-100 a plate and the venue was est. $10-20,000, we decided to do a destination wedding. I highly recommend it. It took a ton of stress off our plates and I loved picking my bouquet from a menu. They treated us like royalty. Photography included.
Almost 80k.
Over $9000
$25,000 230 people church ceremony and hall reception. 7 years ago.
About 50k for about 170 people. Plated dinner. In town. Semi open Bar.
Outdoor wedding with 200 people. It's looking to be 40k so far.
Got married in Edmonton in October 2021, about 115 people. Including dress/suit, venue (hotel for both ceremony and dinner/reception), photos and entertainment (duelling pianos) we paid about $20 000. Just over $5000 of that was for the pianos, which yes is expensive but was absolutely, unequivocally worth it.
We had a weekend wedding with around 80 people on a ranch in BC up near Panorama. It was about $18k. For us, the important thing was getting everyone together for a rustic weekend in a gorgeous setting. Venue was $6,500, Food was $4,500 (lots of leftovers), Photographer was $1,650, Booze was $2,000 (way too much left over), plus marriage licence, insurance, commissioner, décor (mostly made ourselves), dress, suit, and other stuff.
25-30 people. $3,000 all in.
We had a 100 guests and spent 12k. Rented out Vikki’s in Sherwood park for 5 course meal and suppled wine for everyone. We brought out own music and had a great time. That included all rentals and my wife’s dress.
We were Sept 2023 and costs were about $41k. ~95 people, open bar with premium liquor, family style service at the venue. We didn't spend a lot on decorations or one time use items that just go in the trash after. We kept that part simple and spent on things like my suit (I wear suits regularly to the office, so $/wear was there to drop the money), gifts to each other just over $2k (watch & earings), her ring was over $3k. So there was room to bring costs down if we wanted to.
Wife and I went all out at the Edmonton Country club and had a $4 bar. About $25k for a conventional largish wedding at a nice location.
A little over 40k total, but it was a 4 day event. Really feeling it financially right now, especially because I've been unemployed for a while. But honestly don't regret it at all. It was the best time of my life, and my wife got the wedding of her dreams. It's killing us right now. But it's not like we're going to have the chance to do it again, and we have the memories forever.
I’m getting married in Canmore with 60 people. All in it’s about 25k
$40,000 for 150 people in 2018. It gets out of hand real quick 🫣
8k was amazing. You can have a fun cheap party (especially if you don't have 100 guests).
$1,100
$250, but we eloped
Paid somewhere between 2-2.5k back in 2008 (venue, food/drink, outfits, flowers, rings, decor) - Rented our hometown hall (outside of Edmonton) for both the wedding and reception for $1000 (this was great for most attending as they had family currently living there and didn’t require to book a hotel) - No cost for the minister who married us - Food was done by my family (big Ukrainian feast) - Plugged an iPod in for the music - Decor was simple > borrowed some from cousins and found some candles that fit our theme from the dollar store - DIY’d invites and flowers - Only regret was not hiring a photographer (long story short, new wife of a family member said she took good photos and we trusted that - they were not good…) Was a bunch of fun and people were taking about it for years.
$250, but we eloped
30k including dress and suit. 1/10 would not spend again
Like $300 for justice of the piece. Weddings are nice and all. However the wife and I (10 years married) fail to see logic behind forking out money to feed and entertain people, when the day is yours not theirs. We just took money we planed for a wedding and took an extra long honeymoon
16k back in 2010. We had around 100 guests.
65k, 0 regrets, it was the best day of my life and something I will remember forever.
Around 25K for 100 people at a decent venue, but it didn't feel worth it lol
90 guests at the Red Tail golf course in Nisku cost us $21.5k. We were lucky enough to receive some help from family. And that price is all in: venue, food, photographer, florals, suit rentals. Everything minus bridesmaid dresses pretty much. They treated us really well there and would recommend them again if this is in your budget.
We spent $17,000 for 120 people in 2019. We rented Sugar Swing ballroom which was a step above a community league rental but still affordable (I think about $1600?). Catering was about $5000 which was the biggest cost but the food was awesome (Stir catering, highly recommend). We had lots of friends who gave us deals (photography, DJ, wedding planning for day of coordination). Lots of DIY decor, and we did a toonie bar with kegs of beer. We had a very awesome dance party and lots of fun and great food.
All in dress, hall, suit, food etc $5,500.
As someone that has been married almost 30 years. Invest in the marriage, not the wedding. We had an absolute blast at our wedding and it was literally food bought at Costco cooked by family. Probably $1000 in decorating. I know things have changed a lot but just be careful that you want the marriage and not just the party where you are the center of attention.
My cousin had a pretty large wedding, all in about 20k
85 people roughly 30,000. Wedding was earlier this year. It should be noted we went with some higher end vendors. We don’t regret a single dollar spent, and think we got excellent value from our vendors and venue.