How to find your perfect wedding venue on budget!
Your wedding venue is the most important part of your wedding.
it's so important to make sure you book the right place, not only for the actual day but for lead up to the wedding. If you are going to struggle with your venue or wedding planner then it will only cause stress and worry for your wedding.
The venue and relationship with is KEY.
So, back to basics There are two main types of venues, you have probably decided on which without even knowing.
The first is ‘catered’. These usually have food and drink included within a package for you. They might be Hotel, Manor House or Country Estate. They will usually organise all the “behind the scenes stuff” eg. staffing, turnovers etc.
The second is ‘non catered’, so this could be a teepee, a field, at home, or barn where it’s up to you to organise everything and you are justing paying to hire the space. You get to create your vision from the ground up, just please remember to hire toilets!
In this blog we are going to focus on finding catered wedding venues as that is what we know! If you are looking to hire a non catered wedding venue, I would highly suggest hiring a wedding planner, now.
The venue search is on!
There are so many amazing websites to browse possible wedding venues, they give you a perfect snapshot of the venue. The two main ones are Hitched or Bridebook, they have fab features to let you filter and begin to shortlist the venues you would like o get in contact with.
Just promise me before you start venue shopping you will read our blog post “The first 6 things you must do when you are engaged”
BUT if you don’t (naughty!) let me give you a super quick recap. When searching for your venue it will help to have an idea of : Budget + Guest Numbers + Wedding Date + Style/ Feel. Told you it was super quick!
So you have searched through a couple (hundred) venues, it’s time to put your Mrs Marple hat on and delve DEEP…
Reviews - Now, I have great dislike for reviews sites (cough, TripAdvisor) like every other hospitality professional, it doesn’t stop me scouring review sites every time I book a holiday, hotel or a cafe for a cup of tea. Firstly, if a venue has one bad review it doesn’t mean you banish that venue to the dark depths of your no pile. Every venue will have bad/not great reviews, fact. Just read the response from the venue, this is usually very enlightening. Just like your Mother taught you when you snitched on your sibling when you were young, ‘‘there is always two sides to every story’. Also, when I say look at reviews, I mean LOOK because they tell you a lot without even knowing, even the good ones. If one review states that “Bob was amazing from booking to my daily emails to making sure everything was perfect on the day” This tells you, that this venue doesn’t pass weddings from the sales to operations team. By now you know what you want from your wedding, so look for it in reviews, don’t just look for how beautiful the venue is; you can see that in the photos!
Social Media - Especially Instagram and Facebook will help give a really great insight into the style of weddings the venue holds. Websites only get updated monthly/quarterly so the social media will have the most up to date photos. Now, when I say the style of wedding I don’t just mean wedding styling. I mean, if you are wanting an intimate wedding with a family feel and on their instagram there is photograph of staff serving food with white gloves and a grand toastmaster with a red coat and a top hat, this might not be the feel you want from your venue.
PLUS Social media is usually the personality of a business, so you can get more of a feel of what the team is like who will be looking after through behind the scenes videos or photos.
This is why the more you know about what you want your wedding venue before you start contacting venues or show rounds will mean a lot less wasted time!
Time to make contact
So, you have your 12 (on average) venues you would like to contact, time to get on your email and make sure if there is something that is very important to you (ie. full exclusivity with all bedrooms booked) that you make sure you tell the venue straight away. There are three pieces of initial information you need from the venues…
Date Availability
Quote
Package
Date Availability - Pretty self explanatory but remember what I have said before, remember to go to your venue with 3(ish) dates to be as flexible as possible.
Quote - Now I am going to cruel to be kind here. Do not starting viewing venues that are out of your price range it will just mean tears and disappointment in venues that are in your budget. So take the times to get a budget written down, I have gone through it in depth here and once you have contacted your venues for quotes make sure you say bye bye to the ones that are just not achievable. One of my very good friends, owns a bridal store and she told me the first question she asks is their price point and never shows a dress over the price point. It saves a whole lot of heartbreak and I could not agree more!
Package - Oooh the nitty and gritty of every venue! Annoyingly for you every venue package is different but sometimes sneakily similar. Once you have thrown away venues that don’t have your availability and are out of your price range. Sit down with their packages and note down the differences. I have had numerous couples explain to me that another venue is £X amount less than us. Then when we sit down and go through the packages the differences are gaping to justify the difference in price so take the time to compare them. There is no point picking a cheaper venue to have to add on as much or more just to host your wedding!
Wedding showrounds
FIRST SHOWROUND
Okay I can feel your excitement, I am excited too. I love wedding show rounds!
Rule one - always book your wedding show round! Don’t just drop in, us wedding planners like to make sure doors are open, lights are switched on that everything looks just how it would be on your wedding day. Don’t give them heart palpitations! I have been doing back to back show rounds in the past and had couples just show up and I feel awful turning them away.
Rule two - Think about who you are taking with you, the best first show rounds are just with the wedding couple. Take family members and friends to the second wedding show round.
Rule three - Once the wedding planner has shown you round, ask to go round once again by yourselves. It’s amazing what you will pick up on when it’s just the two of you and you have already been round once.
What to expect on a show round?
Meeting one of the wedding planners
Having a cup of tea / glass of bubbly and chatting about your wedding plans. The wedding planner should be really interested in what you want from your wedding day. This is the starting point of that relationship I spoke about above.
Walking round the venue seeing all the highlights
Answering any questions you have
What to ask on a wedding show round?
Check out my piece on What to ask your wedding venue before booking.
See, not too difficult! Especially if you have done your homework beforehand. You are not expected to book your wedding on first view so don’t panic or feel pressured!
SECOND SHOWROUND
This is when you bring out the big guns, you have had chance to sleep on the venue, you have looked at other venues (on average 6) and then you shortlist around 3 venues to view again. You are going to want to take crucial family members and friends who opinion you value, especially if they have been married before! So take your notes/questions and enjoy seeing these venues for the second time.
I am a BIG believer in just knowing it’s your venue. Like when you buy a house or meet your partner, you just feel it you know. You have to be able to envision yourself in a gorgeous white dress walking round your venue.
If you are lucky (or not lucky) to love two venues the same, I find a good old pros and cons list will help.
Final bits & pieces
So you are very nearly there, don’t let your excitement in booking overshadow you asking the questions and reading terms and conditions to make sure you are more than happy with everything. Most venues allow a provisional hold on dates (7 to 14 days), use this time to breath and read through the contract before signing and paying deposits. Also, make sure to get wedding insurance, I don’t know how to stress the importance of this. PLEASE BUY WEDDING INSURANCE!
And there you are, you have booked the most important part of your wedding. Congratulations! Now you can start planning the rest - enjoy!
If you are still unsure or would like some venue suggestions, let me know. I am more than happy to point you in the right direction!
Check out the rest of our wedding advice pages for tonnes of help!
Olivia Gray
Director
Olivia is part of the Sparth House owning family. Over the past 6 years, she reimagined and redesigned how the House hosts weddings. With nearly 300 Sparth House weddings under her belt, her goal has always been to achieve the most personalised day for each couple
Her favourite moment of a wedding? “The moment I share with each bride before they walk down the aisle, I get chills every time!”
Where will you find Olivia? “Working with a cup of tea or glass of wine (or both!) in hand.”
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