“Mia and Kyle just got engaged! Did you hear? This is going to be a super organised wedding – you know what they are like. Mia’s got a list of everything to do, time frames and a budget for everything. She’s scoured the internet for average prices for vendors and is going to aim for as many bargains as she can, starting with the celebrant. And she has a permanent search in for coupon codes and discounts… Do you know of any celebrants that have sales at the moment?”
Does this sound familiar? Or even worrying? Yes I may have exaggerated about looking for coupon codes for celebrants, but in all seriousness, sometimes in the overwhelm of the cost of a wedding, couples revert to the obvious strategy of saving money where ever they can. There’s nothing wrong with this, and it’s great to think carefully about what you spend your money on. But mindful and intentional spending is a totally different thing to looking for bargains. And not getting it right, can be more expensive than you think.
When should cost be the most important factor?
Let’s start with the humble carton of milk. This is called a “commodity” in the retail world. Why? Because there are some items that at their base are the same thing, regardless of how you package them. Milk is Milk. Ok there are plenty of varieties of alternative milks these days – but lets just talk about cows milk. If you just want milk, you’re going to choose the cheapest carton. There’s an important caveat to this – but I’ll discuss this later. It’s also like petrol – we spend ages looking for the cheapest price at the pump, and don’t worry that a cheaper petrol will be inferior – because they’re all the same – right? Petrol is Petrol. It’s a commodity.
People. People are not a commodity. It doesn’t matter how you spin it, no one person is exactly the same as another, and the skill set they bring to a task varies. For some tasks it doesn’t matter. If the job is manually repetitive and everyone can do it to the same level, well perhaps it doesn’t matter. But when the service you want requires people skills that result in a range of outcomes from absolutely mind-blowing to average or perhaps even worse – on one of the most important days of your life, well now it really matters.
If you want to save money in a wedding, focus on reducing the cost of “things” – aka “commodities”. Its so tempting to want to have all the bells and whistles, but these little things actually really inflate the cost of a wedding, and they are not, and I’ll repeat it, they are not the things that make an unforgettable wedding. It’s the people. The human connections. The emotions. The fun. The special moments. And the sense of meaning.
Engaged couples often make a crucial mistake when choosing a wedding celebrant by focusing solely on cost, yet its your celebrant who plays a pivotal role in helping you realize your dreams and create unforgettable moments.
The role of the celebrant
A celebrant isn’t just there to tick the legal boxes and get you married. To make your special day truly magical, a great celebrant invests time getting to know you, grasping what makes your heart tick, and helping craft a ceremony that stands out as the highlight of your wedding. They don’t just show up on the day but stand by your side from the moment you engage their services.
They are also the vendor you are likely to spend the most time with, and a great celebrant can help to guide you through the minefield of planning decisions that lay ahead. A great celebrant will also ensure your wedding is highly personalised and authentically you. You’re not a commodity either, and the combination of experiences you desire, your values, your desire for meaning will be different to others. On top of this, you can’t know what you don’t know in terms of options. Your experiences of weddings to date will only have provided you with a small amount of information. A great celebrant will open doors for you that you never knew existed!
The hidden costs of cheap
If your father had serious heart issues and could see a specialist or his general practitioner for a quarter of the cost, who would you want him to see? You’d want the best right? As a general rule, we don’t buy cheap products expecting high quality.
I’m not saying that cheap necessarily means low quality – but if you are making choices based on price alone and going for the lowest you can find, your bargain basement prices are rapidly increasing your risk of poor quality for one of the most important days of your life.
Imagine spending $30k on a wedding only to have a low energy, boring ceremony that didn’t reflect you as a couple at all. That left you a little, well, “ho hum”? Or worse still, what if the celebrant missed an important legal step or didn’t show up? How much could cheap services actually cost you?
Key takeaways
On average, couples in Australia spend $34,715k on a wedding (2023 Australian Wedding Industry Report) A celebrant may cost between $500 and $2k which pales in comparison to the overall expenditure, but may be one of the biggest influencers of your wedding experience.
A great celebrant will be highly skilled in designing a ceremony around you, reflecting your values and your personalities. They will put the hard yards in to truly understand what you want, and offer what you’ve never thought of. They will aim for nothing less than perfection, and be skilled in addressing anything unanticipated. They will reassure you every step of the way, and find ways to make the whole experience as easy as possible for you, not for them. They may also offer MC services, allowing you and your guests to have a seamless, amazing leadership all day long.
If you want to spend your money wisely – my recommendation is to focus on the people who are skilled enough to deliver the wedding day of your dreams, that is highly personalised, fun and meaningful, and then adjust the cost of the commodities around that.
Editors Note: Look out for next month’s article on how to find a great celebrant!
