Our beautiful city of Orlando hosts many destination weddings each year. Complete Weddings + Events loves being able to create and capture all of those beautiful weddings. We have some advice on how to properly plan your destination wedding in Orlando. There are many questions you should ask and make sure are in order before sending out your invites. Here are the top things to consider when planning your destination wedding in Orlando:
Understand the Cost, Put Together Your Budget
Consider the amount of money you would like to spend before making the jump to go full board on a destination wedding. Otherwise, it’s completely possible you could end up booking a venue and caterer only to find out that you don’t have anything left for plane tickets, hotels, photography, etc. You don’t want to be left in limbo. Therefore, do a bit of footwork before making a firm decision. Get some quotes from local vendors so you can get a clear picture of what your wedding might cost.
Finding the Venue
Make the jump to plan your destination wedding once you figure out if a destination wedding will fit your budget. Now it’s time to find a venue to host your wedding. Finding your venue can be difficult when doing it from afar. However, we have a couple of strategies you can follow. Here are the two ways you can find your venue while planning from a different city and state.
Virtual Venue Search:
The most common way people find their venue in Orlando is through virtual tours, phone calls, and emails. This is by far and away the easiest way to find the venue you’re on the hunt for. Most venues will accommodate virtual visits either by sending video walkthroughs or actually Zooming you into a walk-through. This allows your host to answer questions at the same time. Technology has made planning from afar much easier.
Little “Planning Trip”
This strategy is a bit less common, mostly due to the cost. However, it’s certainly the most fun way to plan! What makes your wedding planning more fun than a trip to Orlando, Florida with some venue tours scheduled? Plan a long weekend and come on down to tour some of the most popular venues and meet with some vendors to help you make your decision. Maybe even put a day or two aside to visit the beach or head to a theme park!
Find Your High Priority Vendors
You’ve got your venue and your date is set in stone so you can take a huge deep breath! The next thing to do is ask your venue which vendors work there the most. Your venue knows who works best with them and can probably give you some great advise since you won’t have any other locals to ask. Once you have a list of vendors to look into start doing research and contact the vendors Once you have these high priority vendors locked in you can start filling the gaps in with the lower stress bookings like cake, décor, etc.
Booking the Rest
Every vendor is crucial to making your wedding day go perfectly. However, some vendors book up quicker than others and those vendors tend to be the more popular ones. With that being said, you should move quickly after each checkbox is filled. Don’t get stressed and have a ton of fun, especially with this part!
Finding the décor, the cake, the rentals, and so on should be fun and be somewhat inspired by your Pinterest boards and the ideas that are, quick frankly, fun to think about! The rest of the planning is when you can let your creativity flow and put your personal style on the wedding. Make sure you communicate what you want to each vendor in this stage and have a blast!
Putting it All Together
First off, take a huge breath of fresh air because you did it! You have officially planned a wedding. Now you just have to execute it! Make sure you’re staying in contact with your vendors and get them everything they need. You want to be positive once the wedding day is here so that you can relax and not worry about the details. This is a pretty simple step but it’s often overlooked by most couples!
Complete Weddings + Events Orlando, FL
We would love to put together a package that works for you and your fiancé to use for your destination here in Orlando! Make sure to reach out to us to begin planning as we love working with couples coming down to make their destination wedding in Orlando, FL a reality! Contact us to learn more about our DJ, photography, videography, photo booth, and uplighting services today!