What a SCAM!!!!

I asked a family friend who is a florist and she said try farmer's markets also for really good wholesale prices. I was hoping to get engaged but I don't know about the stress of putting together a wedding! I might just want to elope and have a big party after.

[HeyMeganZ]

oyy....see if you can have someone else also call back to get a quote for a party. they jack the price up a lot as soon as they hear wedding. I called around to every pottery barn on the east coast and sourced lanterns on clearance for decoration. that saved a ton.

[scarlett09]

Ugh, I was trying to put up pics of my flowers and my browser ate my post!

I'm not even going to discuss how much was spent on flowers at our wedding. My momzilla went a little crazy, and if she wanted to spend her 401k on this crap (and if my father wasn't opposed since he would have paid for the whole wedding if the momzilla went off the deep end), I wasn't going to stop her. The results were beautiful, and I'm going to try another post to see if I can't put up the pictures.

My aunt, who is also a florist, did my bouquet and DH's boutinerre. She spent time with me, listening to what I wanted and selecting flowers that looked pretty/would last all day/wouldn't shed pollen on my dress. They turned out beautifully and I'm hoping to find a great way to preserve them once we have a little bit more cash.

I think you should splurge on whatever means the most to you and your DF. For us, it was the officiant and ceremony music. Oh, and the food, lol. But everything else I really could have cared less about, with a few notable exceptions. And depending where on the East coast you are going to be wed, I could help with vendors.

Ok now to fiddle around with pictures...

[scarlett09]

DJ and Table.jpg
Low centerpiece (and arch from ceremony walkway behind our table)


High centerpiece (which were my fave and the only flower-related item I wanted, besides the canopy for the ceremony and the bouquet made by my aunt).
High Centerpiece.jpg

[lovelight]

I made my bouquet and the bridesmaids because all the florists try to rob you!! Those were out only flowers. The venue was already decorated (bonus for getting married in the christmas season!) and our centerpieces were personalized golf balls and tees with the table numbers being the pin flags.

[JDAZ11]

Wedding industry = scam! I think the people at the bridal dress salons are cut throat stereotypical used car salesmen disguised as "sweet ladies". I agree. Pick what is important to you and splurge on that. The rest, go cheap....and if you can, just say that you are having a family gathering. I swear that once you say wedding, they tack on another 25%.

I totally agree about the used car salesmen at bridal salons comment! That is a whole different fun story...

Dress story: my mom really really wanted to go to Klienfelds before I left NY. It was supposed to really be a sight seeing type trip (we all kind of like that show). I was not at all ready to buy a dress, mainly because the wedding was more than a year away. It was also the day before DF and I were coming out to look at housing, and so I was starting to get pretty stressed about moving.

I left with a dress. They totally lied to me - it was a trunk show. the lady told me it would be months before stores would have samples of the dress in to try on again, and somehow convinced me I had to buy it that day (i should have been more rational, but I just wasn't really myself that day). They of course had it in month later when I thought I had changed my mind and wanted to cancel the order. I ended up going to try it on again and it is amazing, but I'd prefer not to think about how totally redic the price was (although we did get like 20% and the designer threw in about $600 worth of alternations for "free"). Never ever shop there, ever - especially not on a Saturday. End dress story - it is actually very very beautiful, but it was certainly a "splurge" item.

I agree that dropping the W word is like a kiss of death. So many places seem to have different pricing sheets for special events vs weddings.

It's been an eye opening experience. I hope I have boys (or kids that can pay for their own weddings!).

[JDAZ11]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]1393[/ATTACH]
Low centerpiece (and arch from ceremony walkway behind our table)


High centerpiece (which were my fave and the only flower-related item I wanted, besides the canopy for the ceremony and the bouquet made by my aunt).
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1392[/ATTACH]

Amazing! So pretty!!

[JDAZ11]

Love your cake too. Think it's very similar to what we are doing. (the venue makes the cake - if you use an outside vendor they charge like $6 a person... No chance of that happening).

I'll pm you the location. There is a decent chance you are familiar with the area

[JDAZ11]

My mom did ours (everything! Even table centerpieces) way in advance, with fake flowers. They photographed beautifully, and I didn't have to pay anything.
I know several people who have done this and even hired out the arranging work - still so much cheaper!
Just a thought...

Quite a few people have suggested the silk (I think) flower idea to me too. Could be a good option (and maybe I could sell them afterwards, lol! I'm all about selling all this crap - my dress is going on preownedweddingdresses.com the second I take it off!).

[JDAZ11]

I took a $40 flower arranging class designed for weddings and ordered $300 worth of roses hydrangeA and carnations from farmstogo.com

They were awesome. My sister and I made 10 corsages 8 bouquets 10 bouts and 15 centerpieces in one afternoon. Wasn't bad at all and the end result was awesome. We used vases filled with lemons too. Wish I could easily dig up pics.

The class was invaluable though

Thank you so much for the info. And CONGRATS on the new baby!!!

Scarlett, I love the centerpiece with the candles! JDAZ, I swear, I'm beginning to think there's a special place in hell for wedding swindlers. It'll be a very bad place where they'll all want to get married but they charge each other up the *ss and can't do anything about it. And they can't touch anything or try anything on.

Being in the wedding industry I have to offer a bit of defense here. Yes there are some people that overcharge, but with things like flowers....thy are providing a service as well as product. In most cases you are talking about coordinating the purchasing, arranging, getting to venue, breaking down after venue etc. This takes time, people, vehicles, plus material cost. It isn't fair to look just at the flowers and say that doesn't cost that much, because these other conveniences they are providing or non tangible. Given there are still people that overcharge, there are people that are just doing a good job and expecting to be compensated appropriately.

I sell wedding invitations, people are constantly complaining about price. I just offer them a variety of options including the option to pick out pretty paper and envelopes and print themselves if they dont want to pay for crane etc. At least half the time they come back because they were not happy with what they ordered online, or made themselves. Sometimes a good deal is really out here, and sometimes you just get what you paid for. Pick and choose where you want to splurge and save.....just beware of the "too good" deal.

Good luck with the planning and try to enjoy it even thought it gets stressful!

My apologies, MissMartini! I wrote somewhere that a lot of lawyers get the bad end of the stick because of a few bad seeds. I admit I am guilty of the same thing with wedding people

[Ravenclaw]

We got married in NY (LI specifically) and I used florists that a friend had used for her wedding. Her wedding cost over 6x as much as ours but the florists asked for my price range per centerpiece and what I wanted to spend total on flowers and designed some arrangements based on that. My sister used artificial flowers that we arranged ourselves but I thought it was too stressful (bc her wedding was huge) and didn't have the same look as fresh flowers.

[JDAZ11]

Being in the wedding industry I have to offer a bit of defense here. Yes there are some people that overcharge, but with things like flowers....thy are providing a service as well as product. In most cases you are talking about coordinating the purchasing, arranging, getting to venue, breaking down after venue etc. This takes time, people, vehicles, plus material cost. It isn't fair to look just at the flowers and say that doesn't cost that much, because these other conveniences they are providing or non tangible. Given there are still people that overcharge, there are people that are just doing a good job and expecting to be compensated appropriately.

I sell wedding invitations, people are constantly complaining about price. I just offer them a variety of options including the option to pick out pretty paper and envelopes and print themselves if they dont want to pay for crane etc. At least half the time they come back because they were not happy with what they ordered online, or made themselves. Sometimes a good deal is really out here, and sometimes you just get what you paid for. Pick and choose where you want to splurge and save.....just beware of the "too good" deal.

Good luck with the planning and try to enjoy it even thought it gets stressful!

Yikes - sorry! Didn't mean to offend at all!! PLanning is actually a little stressful at times - and there seems to be sticker shock for me around every corner! I totally agree that you get what you pay for with almost everything, and that the vendors I've talked to really know their stuff - so I suppose their mark up is generally worth it. This guy in particular is clearly marking up the flowers, plus charging $5K to for labor, and a 20% service charge. In my opinion that is kind of a lot to pay for his expertise. I haven't felt totally scammed by everyone, but I was pretty taken aback by this one. We've gone a bit over budget on almost everything - but his quote kind of made me want to vomit!

If it is any consolation... I didn't feel scammed at all by the invites, lol.