Money-saving wedding tips for the couple and guests

Congratulations. You’re marrying the love of your life, or someone you know is and you’re going along for the ride.

The average Aussie wedding costs between $36,000 and $51,000, according to Canstar.

It’s basically a whole year’s worth of a starting salary.

It’s also the price of a new car, an overseas holiday, and a significant start on a home deposit.

How can you fit everything in?

There’s a way to live happily ever after without paying for it forever.

And in Part One of our Spaceship Guide to Cheaper Living series, we’re showing you how to do just that.

For the happy couple

Set – and stick to – a budget

One wedding planner found the average couple overspends their budget by almost 26%.

And even when you’re not overspending – inflation is still playing its part.

“When we began planning our wedding in 2022, we reached out to some friends who had paid for their own weddings in 2018,” said Blair.

“They had spent around $12,000 on their weddings back then. We thought it would be helpful to use their wedding as a reference point to estimate our own costs.

However, when we calculated the expenses, it turned out the costs had gone way up, coming in to be over $20,000!”

Sticking to your budget is important.

Typical large expenses can include: venue; video/photography; celebrant; dress/suit; transport; music; flowers; food; the cake; furniture/decorations; cake; invitations; hair and makeup.

To keep it more affordable, Gemma from our Spaceship community is “DIYing where possible and prioritising the important things while doing away with expenses that don’t matter.”

Don’t mention the W word

“Venues will literally hike prices JUST because it’s a wedding,” said Andrea from our Spaceship community. Her solution is to hold her wedding overseas where her money will go further – but if you don’t want to do that, just keep the W word under wraps.

This could mean shopping for a white dress instead of a wedding dress; or buying a party makeup package instead of a bridal one (this may mean you miss out on a test look).

Curate your guest list

There’s a case to be made for keeping your guest list small, which is: think about all the weddings you’ve been to. How many of the couples are you still in contact with?

Some ways to keep your guest list down:

Limit plus-ones, children, your co-workers, and people you haven’t seen – or heard from – in more than a year, plus neighbours, problematic friends, and anyone your parents want to invite.
Limit peer-pressure by keeping your guest list under wraps until the event.
Offer a virtual attendance option.

Give everyone a job

If you’ve got talented friends and family – put them to work! We’re sure you’d return the favour.

Ask your music snob friend to DJ the dance floor; your cousin who’s great at cooking to make your wedding cake; or your graphic designer brother-in-law to help with the invitations.

Of course, make sure your friend or relative actually wants to help out. It could even count as their wedding gift to you.

You may find your friends will even offer, like David’s did.

“One of our guests had a Jaguar and offered to drive the wife from our house to the park!” he shared.

Have a microwedding

Microweddings are intimate celebrations for you, your partner, and select family and friends.

You’ll typically find yourself in a small venue or restaurant, with up to 20–50 of your nearest and dearest.

It’s an option Angelica chose after having to reschedule her wedding multiple times during the pandemic – and she ended up ahead.

“We approached our wedding by focussing on where we wanted to make the most of our money.

We kept it very simple but meaningful.

Firstly, we reduced the guest list from 90 to 25 people and filtered by thinking of the people who are very important to us and will be present for a long time.

We decided to get married at the registry.

Nowadays, registries offer multiple affordable options. They even provide you the option of customising your dream wedding with their help.

In our case, we decided to keep it simple and went to the closest Registry.

We kept everything close distance and convenient for us, our suppliers (photography, flowers, and make-up artists), and our guests.

We hired a local photographer and did our photography location scouting. Our photoshoot was done in a beautiful park near our place.

Our reception was in a Restaurant, which offered a private room. We had access to a fantastic set menu and a great atmosphere within the privacy of the room.

Most of our money was focused on having fantastic food and drinks in a well-known restaurant.

The drinks were based on consumption. We analysed how much our guests would drink. In our case, it was cheaper to pay by consumption than open bar. We also selected the drinks we were having that night.

We created our playlist and curated it for different moods throughout the night.

For the flower arrangements and bridal bouquet, we went for native Australian flowers in season. Therefore, they were more affordable.

We bought our wedding outfits with designs that we can wear in the future for other occasions and not only for just one time.

I designed the invitations, tag names and everything, and we kept most of the designs digital.

We also tried to involve our guests with little tasks so they felt part of the celebration. We didn’t hire a photographer for our reception, so we asked our guests to take photos with their phones or the Polaroid camera to be part of it. Everyone had a great time doing it.

And the most important thing, the bride and the groom set the mood. Everyone is so excited to celebrate with you that if you share that happiness back, it makes it a wonderful and memorable day.”

Combine surrounding celebrations

Engagement parties, bridal showers, hen’s’ parties, buck’s’ nights, rehearsal dinners... And that’s before the big day.

Consider culling or combining an event or two to save on cash.

Have a winter wedding

Consider getting married during winter and you’ll have less competing weddings to contend with, you could potentially get discounts for off-peak seasons, anyone wearing a suit will be less sweaty, and, your wedding anniversary will also be during winter each year, which means you’ll have the perfect excuse to take a yearly, beach holiday! Win, win, win!

Get thrifty

You can pretty much rent and thrift anything these days.

And let’s face it: white dresses in non-wedding locations can be awkward, and there just aren’t too many occasions that call for black suits.

Check out Facebook marketplace, eBay, and Depop for pre-used wedding clothing and decorations. You could save a significant amount, contribute to the circular economy, and cut down on waste.

Hack your flowers

Rose is planning her wedding.

“More greenery in the flowers than flowers brings costs down,” she shared.

Other tips for cheaper flowers include making sure you pick stems that are in season; repurposing your bridesmaid bouquets as centrepieces; and reusing your ceremony flowers as your reception flowers.

Wedding guest tips

Part of a couple? Decide who gets to go

If you’ve both been invited but only one of you really knows the couple, consider letting somebody stay home.

“Potentially only one of us will be going to the weddings rather than both. We’re struggling a lot to keep it affordable and within holiday entitlements,” said Brook.

Start planning early

Jane’s been feeling the crunch.

“As a guest, it's so difficult to keep it affordable particularly when you need to travel.

I would book flights as early as possible, take advantage of what the bride and groom offer such as room blocks or transport, and set a reasonable budget for gifts, then factor this into planning to attend. It's also good to group up with friends for accommodation.”

Re-wear your outfits

As a guest, you’re not the star of the photos, and what you wear may not matter as much as you think it does.

This is what Rachel concluded.

“Don't be afraid to re-wear outfits or borrow dresses from friends!”

Use your points

If you’re lucky enough to be able to go to a destination wedding, don’t forget to take advantage of your points.

“With a lot of distant weddings that we have to fly to, my partner and I have saved a lot by using Frequent Flyer points. We’ve been rolling through credit cards with points bonuses to help us collect them too,” said Laura.

This is one of our top 12 money-saving travel tips as well.