A Little Bit Richer
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Kia: While your wedding date is one of the happiest days of your life, it can also be one of the most expensive days. In 2023, the average UK wedding costs over 20, 000 pounds with the cost of living and inflation pushing up prices from 2022. But proper planning, budgeting, and research can help you build the day of your dreams and reduce the financial stresses to that you focus on the fun build up to your big day. Welcome to another episode of A Little Bit Richer, brought to you by my friends at Legal and General.
Here to help us navigate the world of weddings and how to manage the costs is Ellie Austin- Williams. Ellie is the author of Money Talks: A Lifestyle Guide for Financial Wellbeing and the founder of This Girl Talks Money. With an online community of over 50,000 people, Ellie provides knowledge, insights, and a safe space to help people gain confidence and ownership over their finances. Welcome to the show Ellie.
Ellie: Thank you for having me.
Kia: I'm excited to talk about this, because for once, I actually am not the expert. I'm here to learn from you.
Ellie: Okay, I'll do my best.
Kia: I'm super excited to talk about this. So we're talking all about love and weddings.
Ellie: Yes.
Kia: To get things started, what advice would you have for couples at the beginning of their wedding planning journey to help them manage the costs of the big day?
Ellie: Well, I think to start off with, enjoy the moment. When you get engaged, it's so exciting and I think that we're talking about money today and that is a big aspect of it, but there's definitely a time for celebration and excitement before you get into the nitty- gritty.
The first thing that I would always encourage people to do is to sit down together and write down your priorities. Individually, first of all, what your priorities are when you think about what you want your wedding to look like. And then compare notes and go through and see, are they aligned? If not, no problem, but you are going to keep coming back to this list of priorities. And if you don't do it, it's going to end up causing chaos when you go through the planning and particularly the budget.
Kia: I think that's a really good point. Because for me what's really important is the dress and the food. Everything else we can cheap out on in my opinion, but the dress and the food is what ... especially the food.
Ellie: Absolutely. Because most of us are working to some sort of budget with a wedding. If you don't have an unlimited budget, you have to make choices and you want to make sure that you're making those choices in a way that aligns with getting you as close as possible to the day that you've envisaged and the day that you've dreamed. You need to have an order of priority to work through or you're just going to end up getting tied up in knots.
Kia: I love that. I think it is so crucial. Off the back of budget then, what suggestions do you have around managing and allocating a wedding budget?
Ellie: I think first of all, you really need to get clear on what your budget is at the start, because the biggest trap you can fall into when you're getting married is looking at things you can't afford. Do not go near a dress that is outside your budget. Because I can tell you, you'll fall in love with that dress and every dress that's in your budget that you try on-
Kia: You won't like anymore.
Ellie: You won't like anymore. So there is no point doing it. So get really clear on what your budget is before you start actually looking. But don't start actually going and viewing things, trying stuff on, ordering things, until you know what you're working with. And that involves having some of the conversations that you might need to have about budget. Because we're in 2024, things are a bit different in terms of how couples fund weddings.
A lot of couples self- fund them. A lot of people do still get family help, but family help can mean both families. So have those conversations early on so there aren't any surprises, there aren't any misaligned expectations, and you can go into the actual planning process with your eyes open and with a clear idea of how much money you've got in that account to spend.
Kia: Realistic expectations is such a big thing, because if people are going to contribute, because they've said ... sometimes you might have family members who say, " Oh yeah, don't worry, we'll help you out." Okay, but how much?
Ellie: What does that mean?
Kia: How much is that helping out? Is that 500 pounds? Is that a couple of grand? What am I looking at so I can factor that into how much we actually have to spend on that wedding.
Ellie: Yeah, absolutely. Because the difference between 500 and 2, 000 when you're planning a wedding is a lot. So you need to know that because you don't want to fall into the trap where you make the 2, 000 pound decision and it turns out you're only getting 200 pounds.
Kia: Oh my gosh.
Ellie: And then you've got to plug the gaps. And it happens so often and it can be avoided a lot of the time by having these conversations up front.
Kia: I think a lot of people are just worried to talk about money and it's not easy. I don't think we're saying it's easy.
Ellie: No, it's not.
Kia: But it is important if you want to stay within your budget it is very, very important. As we've said, paying for a wedding is a big expense, and when you couple that with our normal financial commitments, it can get quite pricey. So do you have any thoughts on how people can get that money together for the big day?
Ellie: Yeah, absolutely. We're talking about a cost of around 20, 000 pounds is the average at the moment in the UK. And obviously that's an average, so a lot of weddings are going way above that. The cost of living is high at the moment, so it's no surprise people are getting stressed and worried about how to afford a wedding. There are a few different things to think about.
First of all, a longer engagement can help give you time. There is absolutely no need to rush a wedding. You can enjoy the engagement. Make the most of it. Add an extra year, in the long term that is not going to make a difference. It gives you that extra 12 months to save up. Thinking about the size of the wedding is also a really helpful way to try and manage costs. Again, I've had so many conversations with people about this.
Where you start off with an idea of the size of the wedding and it just spirals and it can be really difficult, because I know parents typically get very excited when their children are getting married and invite everyone, and that's lovely.
And I do think it's slightly different where you're getting contributions from family in terms of how much control and say they get over what happens with a wedding. But the biggest cost usually is the food and beverage cost per head.
You're looking at somewhere around 90- 100 pounds per person. And given that most weddings you're looking at like 60, 80, 100 guests at least, that's where the bulk of that cost tends to come from if you're sitting down and having a three course meal with drinks and the champagne reception and all of that. Scaling down the size of the wedding can really help you to manage the costs.
Obviously, if you can save as much as possible then that is brilliant. But I know that a lot of people will be in a situation when they're thinking about borrowing for a wedding. And the first thing to say there is to just think about how you're going to repay it.
Please do try and think about a plan for repayment, but also factor in the overall cost of lending and try and work out whether the best option for you is going to be a loan or whether there is a credit card where you can get some 0% percent borrowing. It really is going to depend on each individual, but trying to reduce the cost of any borrowing that you do need for the wedding is going to help you overall when it comes to keeping within that budget.
I also think it's really worth thinking about things like the dress. If it's going to take you a year or two to save up the amount for a brand new dress that you want, can you find that dress secondhand, pre- loved, and get it tailored to fit you for a fraction of the cost? There are so many ways that you can be creative now, because you want to enjoy this process of planning a wedding. It's meant to be a celebration. It's meant to be something you enjoy. So putting too much financial pressure on I think can take a bit of that joy away from it.
Kia: I'm happy that you mentioned pre- loved and secondhand. I think it's a great way to reduce the cost and be sustainable.
Ellie: Exactly.
Kia: And enjoy your big day because financial stress shouldn't come into it. However, I would be remiss to say that it is still a massive thing that a lot of couples do experience. So for any couples who are struggling with that financial pressure, what advice would you have for them when it comes to managing that, when they're planning for their wedding?
Ellie: Yeah. I think go back to that starting point that I mentioned about priorities and really sit down and drill into that. Because as much as you start off with these good intentions, and it can be really easy to lose perspective of A, what you set out to achieve and what's important to you, but also B, the constraints that you're working within.
But what I really don't want people to end up doing is finding themselves just popping things on the credit card here, there, everywhere, and forgetting about it and then ending up racking up these really expensive charges because they're trying to achieve this picture perfect day when actually they could do it on a budget and they could stay within their initial constraints. Every time you're making a decision, go back to that priority list, go back to the budget. Where are you? Are things costing more than you expected? Are things costing less? Are there changes that you can make?
If, for example, food is something that's really important to you, what are the creative ways that you can make sure that you're getting the high quality, but without necessarily paying for the three course silver service experience? Because there are options for that. Good food doesn't have to be expensive. Again, venues are another one.
I know a lot of people have the idea in their head of the type of venue that they want for their wedding, but actually can you create the atmosphere and the vibe that you want for your day at a venue that's not going to cost you an arm and a leg? And there are also ways to reduce the cost of a venue. Looking at different seasons is a big one. Looking at different days of the week.
Kia: We have social media, you see what other people have done and you might think, right, I've got to do what this person did, or I've got to try and do better than what they did, but it is your day, so it should be tailored to you and whatever you can afford. But whatever you want, most importantly. What are some other creative ways that couples can implement to reduce the prices that they have to pay for their big day?
Ellie: I think a really good one is thinking about ways that you can do a bit of DIY. Even if you're not doing a full scale DIY wedding, there are elements throughout the day where you can actually get stuck in or you can get your bridesmaids, get the groomsmen, get your mother, friends, family to get involved. One thing that I did for my wedding is we bought a lot of flowers wholesale, and the night before my mum and bridesmaids basically created the table decorations, because I knew it was an area for me where I didn't want to spend a lot of money.
There were other areas where I was like, " That's my priority." So it ended up costing a couple of hundred pounds to do all the table decorations. Where if you pay for table decorations, you're looking at thousands of pounds. Things other people have done are things like dessert tables where you can bake a load of brownies and have a table. Or things like a donut wall. You can have one of those really cool boards where you order loads of donuts and you stick them on and people can go up and take their own.
And yes, it probably costs you a couple of hundred pounds, but compared to adding an extra course to a sit down dinner, then you're going to save money. Thinking a little bit outside the box. And a lot of these things actually you can make look really cute and quirky as well.
Kia: My friend, she had a DJ, so instead of, I know people have bands, but a DJ does help to bring down that cost?
Ellie: Yeah. And also just don't feel the pressure, like you said, to do all the things that you see online. One thing that I have noticed a lot of people have stopped doing, thankfully, and I didn't do it either, are wedding favors. The reality is, no one notices if you've got them or not. And I also think a great tip actually is think about your wedding from the perspective of a guest. So think about when you're a guest at other weddings, what do you notice and what don't you notice? And then apply that to your own wedding as well.
And of course there'll be some things that you just want to do because they matter to you. But another example of this is, is we had the option for the drinks reception of upgrading to a English sparkling wine rather than a Prosecco. And when we were told this, we were like, " Oh, well that would be really nice because it's an English countryside Cotswold wedding. There's something really nice about this English wine." And then we stopped for a second and we thought, have you ever thought, " What am I drinking at a wedding?"
Kia: It's true.
Ellie: I have no idea what I've ever drunk at a wedding. I drink what I'm given. And so we thought, " Okay, we can save ourselves 15 pounds per bottle by not doing that."
Kia: Wow.
Ellie: And these are the kind of costs that we're talking about. 15 pounds a bottle, that's like a lot of bottles, a lot of money.
Kia: Yeah, it's a lot of money you would've spent.
Ellie: Yeah.
Kia: That's a really good outlook and I think what is important to focus on. I've seen many horror stories online of people booking services, booking professionals, and the day comes and they back out last minute, maybe a week before, maybe even a day before, maybe even on the day. I've heard some horrific things.
So I know that there are things that you can do to protect yourself. One thing being potentially wedding insurance. So could you talk to us about wedding insurance and whether or not this is important to have?
Ellie: Yeah, so I think it really depends whether it's worth it based on A, the size of your wedding and the cost of the wedding, but also the different policies of the providers and the suppliers. And that's going to be so individual based on your wedding. There are certain venues that will insist that you have insurance before you go and actually book.
In some cases you are going to have to get a policy in the first place. But I also think it's worth having those conversations with your suppliers, like your photographers, for example, or your band or your DJ, just to see how they tend to operate.
And like you say, sometimes people back out at the last minute. I think it really comes down to checking what the Ts and Cs are before you're signing up, committing money to different suppliers.
And also just looking at the overall cost and working out what would happen if something happened. If you don't have insurance, what's your plan of action? What's your backup? And also if you do have insurance, is it actually going to cover the eventualities that you would like it to cover?
Kia: I know we are naturally programmed to scroll to the bottom of the Ts and Cs and just sign or just click okay. But especially when it comes to wedding, there's a massive expense. I think anything that's going to cost you a whole chunk of money that you don't really want to lose, you should be looking at-
Ellie: Read it properly.
Kia: What are you in for? What are you liable for? What are they liable for? So you can make sure that you are going in with your eyes wide open.
Ellie: Absolutely.
Kia: That's the key thing. Ellie, you have shared some incredible gems and I have learned way more than I thought I would about weddings, so I feel like I'm ready. I'm ready for my big day. Thank you. But before we round off, what are your top three tips for managing the cost of a wedding?
Ellie: Number one, communicate. Communicate, most of all with your partner, but also with the other people in your family, other people that might be involved. Make sure that you are having regular conversations so that you are staying on track when it comes to the budget.
Make sure that everyone is working from the same page. Ultimately, a wedding is a big project that you're all a big team working towards executing, so you are ultimately the project manager. So get on the same page and schedule those regular check- ins, otherwise it will go off plan.
Number two, don't just think about yourself. And I know that sounds strange because it's your big day, but think about what is most important to you when you're planning this wedding. Is it having all the people that you want to be there, or is it having the day in the way that you have pictured it, because they're not always compatible.
And I say that meaning, that a lot of the time what ends up happening is that a bride and groom make decisions about a wedding that basically pushes a lot of costs onto the guests.
They will decide they want a certain venue or a certain destination, and the consequence is that the guests end up having to take off a week from work, pay for expensive flights, pay for expensive accommodation. And what can end up happening is, A, people can feel resentful. People can feel pressured.
But then also I think sometimes people won't be able to go. Asking yourself, what is most important to me? Is it about people being there and spending that day with the people that you love the most? Or is it doing things in the way that you wanted even if it means some of those people can't make it.
And three, don't forget about stag and hen- dos. They can really, really get out of control when it comes to cost. Have a think about how to try to manage a budget for your stag and hen- do.
Kia: Those are some good tips, especially about the stag and hen, I've never really considered that, but it is a part of the budget that you need to factor in.
Ellie: Oh yeah.
Kia: Ellie, you have opened up our eyes and our wallets to what we should be focusing on when it comes to wedding budgets and planning for that big day. So thank you so much for coming onto the podcast.
Ellie: Thank you for having me.
Kia: So much to consider on tying the knot. Thanks for breaking it all down, Ellie. Next time, financial wellbeing expert, Clare Seal will be here to help us feel good about our money. I'd love it if you could review the podcast, spread the word, and help others get a little bit richer too. Keep up with the show on TikTok and Instagram at Legal and General. Thank you for listening. See you soon.
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