In today’s world, couples spend and average $20,000 on weddings. Understanding the costs associated with weddings can help to minimize the amount spent without loosing the integrity of the occasion. There are many steps that can be taken at different stages of planning to help this become successful.

Let’s go ahead and tackle the wedding gown first! Every bride wants the most beautifully complimenting dress that they can afford. Unfortunately some brides tend to go over budget for one reason or another. Have a set budget for the wedding gown and stick to it.

The average cost for a wedding gown is close to $1500. For some brides this is ok, but for others here is an opportunity to save money! Think about it, if you can find a dress that you love for $1500, shouldn’t you be able to find one for $1000 or even $500 and less. Sure you can! The point isn’t to find any $500 dress just for the sake of saving money or at the expense of the brides expectations. However, knowing that there is a $1,500 budget, most brides wouldn’t even entertain dresses in the lower range. Why not? There are tons of beautiful dresses on the low end! It certainly won’t hurt to look. Plus you have a $1,000 incentive to work towards. That’s money that could go a long way on a romantic honeymoon.

Also, if you are planning a themed wedding, use your theme to guide the type of dress you would like to wear. Let's take the beach wedding theme. If you're having your wedding on a beach then you would want to purchase a beach wedding dress. One that's more appropriate to wear in the sun and breeze. Think about every aspect of your wedding from the location to the décor and let that help you decide which dress is right for you and you could end up saving money without feeling like you sacrificed anything.

A wedding cake can cost anywhere from $200 - $800, the average about $500. They are usually charged by the amounts of slices you want. There is a large difference in the price for cakes that have traditional icing than cakes that are covered with fondue, so be sure to check the prices on both options. Again, we have an opportunity to save a good amount of money and still have a great experience. If there’s a supermarket branch in your area that you know sells wonderful cakes, ask them about wedding cakes. You’d be surprised how many of them offer wedding services. Look through the catalogue and choose a decoration that you love. You can probably save about half the amount you would spend at a regular bakery. That honeymoon money is looking pretty good!

Having a photographer at your wedding is a no brainer for most couples. This is the best way to preserve one of the most important days of you life and be able to share with your family and friends in the future. The question now becomes whether or not a “professional” photographer is necessary in order to get great pictures of your day.

The cost for a professional photographer usually ranges from $1,000 to $10,000+. I smell some money saving over here! How you we bring the cost of photography down without the possibility of having really bad pictures on the best day of your life? Let’s break this up a little bit. Have professional pictures taken at a portrait studio BEFORE your wedding! The packages are very reasonable ranging from $20 on up depending on your choices. Now, that’s takes care of the bride and groom, now what about the rest of the wedding party? See if you have a family member or friend, someone that’s not a party of the wedding ceremony, who’s pretty good at taking pictures and arm them with a digital camera. Have some poses in mind or written down and they can be executed as such. Lastly, pictures should be taken at the reception as well. An easy and fun way to accomplish this without bogging any one person down as “the” photographer is to include disposable cameras on each table. Your guests will now become the photographers! You will be able to get your guests perspective of your wedding reception. So overall, you could have photography at your wedding spending no more than $300 (including the portrait package, if you pay the family member/friend, the cost of the disposable cameras, and printing costs). We’ve just added another $700 to our honeymoon spending money! Oh, it’s going to be so nice!

Wedding centerpieces play an important part of the décor at most wedding receptions. Remember, your guest will spend and extended amount of time at the reception tables and the centerpieces are a focal point. So that mean we shouldn’t try to save money on them right? Absolutely not! This is another wonderful opportunity to bank more many.

DIY centerpieces are easily one of the best ways to save money on your  wedding. The average cost for centerpiece arrangements are around $1,200 or more. When couples think centerpiece arrangements they may automatically think of flowers and/or candles. There’s so much more that can be done! Be creative and use this opportunity to add more of you personalities to the table. Literally! DIY centerpieces can cost about $10 per table depending on the materials you choose. Let’s say you have 20 tables in your reception. That’s another $1,000 you’ve just saved!

So, all together we’ve saved almost $3000 that we can put towards the honeymoon, back into the wedding, in our saving account, or whatever your goal was. There are tons more ways to save money in any wedding. It takes a little bit of creativity and small sacrifices, but in the end it will be worth it. Whatever you decide to do be sure to have fun with it!