Venue booking for wedding | Cost saving tips while booking your Wedding Venue
As soon as the wedding date is decided we rush the Venue booking process & immediately start asking for recommendations, quotations, etc. as we feel the venue is most important & everything else can be taken care of later.
Nothing wrong with that, but for a moment just think that everything that you will do after finalizing the venue will depend on your Venue, whether it is booking a caterer or finalizing décor based on the venue, or even inviting a number of people.
Booking a Venue that reflects your vibe & which is perfect for you & your family will be just a piece of cake after watching this video & you will avoid 90% of the challenges related to the venue in your wedding.
So, we will evaluate the venue based on these 3 things.
- Budget
- Vibe/Experience
- Comfort or Convenience
Before we begin, I want to explain to you some basic terminologies used by the venues
Pax – People approximately
Minimum guarantee – Minimum number of guest venue takes order for
Maximum Capacity – Maximum number of guests that venue can serve
Packages
AP (American Plan) – Room rent + 3 meals
MAP (Modified American Plan) – Room Rent + Breakfast + 1 Meal
CP (Continental Plan) – Room Rent + Breakfast
EP (European Plan) – Room Rent
Banquet & Ballroom – Indoor Event Space
Lawn – Outdoor Space
Single Occupancy – 1 person in 1 room
Double Occupancy – 2 people in 1 room
Triple Occupancy – 3 people in 1 room
Moving forward
The biggest challenge is deciding how much to spend on a Venue, as this is the first thing, we finalize we usually overspend for the choice & had to keep tight hands later.
Usually, 30 to 40% of the overall wedding budget can be spent on a venue, for instance, if your budget is
10lakhs – 3lakhs to 4lakhs for venue
20lakhs – 6lakhs to 8lakhs for venue
30lakhs – 9lakhs to 12lakhs for venue
1cr – 30lakhs to 40lakhs for venue
How much budget is Enough for a good Wedding?
Every budget is good if the expectation is limited, so how to set expectations?
For 200 to 250 people
If your budget is 10lakhs & under, go for a local wedding where you don’t have to spend on rooms & guest accommodation (Spend 30% on the venue, 15% on Food, 12% on Décor, 20% on Event)
If your budget is 20lakhs & under & if you are doing a local wedding without rooms, 4star venue is a no-brainer but if you want to plan a destination wedding go for a 3star venue in the radius of 150 to 200kms max that deals in APAI package.
If you have a budget of 30lakhs and above call me.
Don’t consider this to be always true because the final cost depends also on the number of guests that you are inviting.
Now you have your expectation in place so let’s move to the next step
Venue Hunting
Before sending anything have an answer for these 3 things
No of Pax = 250
No of Events = 4
Types of Events = Pool party, Sangeet, Wedding & Reception
Now start building a list
Below websites will help you hunt venues as they have details related to 1000's venues on their site
Make sure to collect this information at the same time according to the excel format below
Download the Excel format Here
Once you have the list
Prepare a Detail Email
Download Email Sample from here
Once you get revert from the properties you can shortlist a few of them that suits your budget + vibe & schedule a visit
Before booking – Pro Tip
Give 1st preference to the venue that gives you the freedom to get your own caterer, decorator & event person
Give 2nd preference to the venue that has multiple people on the panel
Don’t book the venue that has an absolute monopoly, unless that is the only option
Download The Venue Visit Checklist here
Cost-saving tips
- Look for newly made property (which is a challenge for people to find on google)
- Give 1st preference to venue does not have monopoly & more preference to a panel or outside vendors.
- Bulk discount (Go crazy for it)
- Book it early.
You guys are providing on ground genuine information. Thank you so much for that.