The Dreaded 'B' word

Like the GST, weddings have a significant mark-up.

Since the dawn of the modern era, when marriage and weddings stopped being about land acquisitions and bartering of goats, brides have been haunted by the dreaded 'b' word and all its connotations.

The average cost of Australian weddings, according to Bride to Be, is about $50,000. In the Lebanese culture, that buys you half your gigantic family's presence, silk flowers (about as popular as bikinis in Afghanistan) and a trip to your shindig in your electrician brother's panel van.

For 'my people', weddings are the be all and end all of a person's life, and the quality of the wedding says more about the couple and their families than perhaps their actual marriage.

Women love to compare, contrast and comment on everything from clothing to decor, and so, when I walk down the aisle, I'm probably going to be compared to the $75,000 bride and the $120,000 bride. This is not so bad where my family and James' family are concerned.

On the one side, I'm being told to get what I want because it's my day and it comes around once.
On the other, James practically went into cardiac arrest upon discovering that the candelabras I had my eye on would set us back about $2000. Needless to say, it's been back to the drawing board many a time and I'm starting to understand the necessity of meeting in the middle. And it is here that the internet, particularly EBAY, have been my saving grace.

I've set myself a strict $55,000 budget, absorbed as much information as possible from bridal mags and forums, and utilised the talents and help of my family and friends where references for suppliers (and skills, such as invitation-designing) are concerned.

Like the GST, weddings seem to have a significant mark-up, almost as if a product's presence is going to make or break your day. But only if you let it. A simple trick is to remember that there's a life-time commitment after the vows and the dancing and the registry-signing. And the more you save on that special day, the easier the longer life journey will be. After all, three's a crowd, meaning there's only room in a marriage for the bride and the groom. Debt collectors optional.