If you want steak but can only afford Ramen noodles, then something has gotta give! It's not always about how much money you have it's about what ways can stretch your dollar. When you begin to plan your event you must decide what is important to you. Some areas can be cut or eliminated all together to achieve your desired results. You must decide how you want your event to appear, I will say that again, you MUST decide how you want you event to appear. It's okay to have a backyard BBQ if that is what you want, but you do not want your elegant wedding to come off looking like a backyard BBQ...get it?
I will discuss a few ways to cut costs...think about this...you want STEAK but you can only afford RAMEN NOODLES, so what do you do? Well this one is easy....you can have steak but you just won't be able to feed as many people, so the first piece of advice I offer is to trim your guest list. Do you really need 300 of your closet friends? If you insist on having 300 people you have a choice to make...you can serve Ramen Noodles or serve 300 people a very very very small toothpick sized portion of steak. What is more important to you?
Another area where many people attempt to cut costs is the family and friend "hook-up", now this is tricky. Most people have good intentions when they offer to provide a good or service for you, but what YOU the planner must consider is that most times you get what you pay for. FREE is FREE , are you willing to accept the level of service that your cousin will provide just because it is free? I know that we all have people in our lives that can do something really well and that will do it for you at a low cost, but what I advise in this situation is that you still treat it somewhat like a business transaction. You have to be clear on what you are looking for and what you expect, and the provider has to be clear about what they can provide.
I'm a huge advocate of Do It Yourself, but this only works if you know what you are doing! Before you take on any tasks, learn how to do it! Practice, study and then try it out. You don't want to just assume you can make a wedding cake because it seems easy enough. There are plenty of place you can go to learn how to do things that will save you money. The internet is a valuable tool...but again I say beware...try it out before the day of your event.
I will share more on this topic later, but for today I leave you with this.. when you plan your event be REALISTIC about your WANTS and your FINANCES and your RESOURCES, it's easier to plan when you know exactly what you have available to utilize.
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