Source
r/weddingplanning•
_cool_beans_

Today in wedding planning, I learned...

...that stations and buffets are two different things, with two very different price points. My fiancé and I are considering two different caterers. Due to some confusion on my part, and some massive miscommunication, I accidentally requested a detailed price quote from one of them for stations (their most expensive option) when I was imagining buffets (their cheapest option). We got the price quote today and it was over $12,000 more than I had estimated based on an initial, tentative quote for 120 guests. I spent half my day freaking out and feeling deceived. I looked back over the options about an hour ago and saw that stations and buffets are, indeed, two different things. And now I feel like an idiot.

So everyone, what random wisdom did you learn during the planning process? Did you have any "oh em gee I'm such an idiot" moments? Please share!

Posted Feb 2, 2016, 3:42 AM UTC

4020
rockandloveIndianapolis Zoo 6/11/16•

I learned that I had to refinance my house to cover the very much unexpected postage costs. I thought they'd have to bust out the defibrillator at the post office. The cost of those small square sticky pieces of paper gave me PTSD and now I can't mail anything without grumbling to myself like a crazy person about postage costs. Pretty sure I'm claiming stamps as a dependent on my taxes this year.

I also learned that everyone, including people who aren't even invited to the wedding, will have an opinion about how you're planning your wedding and why you're wrong and stupid and why their ideas make so much more sense and they're sooooo smarter than you. We're not doing a wedding website so I put our registry info on an insert card included with our invitation suite, come at me bro.

27
missmuggle•

Haha! This made me choke on my latte on the train.

6
caffeinatedscientist04.September.2016, Pennsylvania•

Hey, Philly!!! My idiot moment came during my tasting when the caterer asked if I was going to put food choices on the place cards to which I asked if that meant I wouldn't take people's options before the wedding and wouldn't that make the food take forever to come out. Nope, she meant I designated what people chose by a mark or something on the card. I'm a scientist, I felt like a doofus.

19
_cool_beans_OP3.18.17 | Philly•

haha, I could totally see myself doing this!

1
SpaceCowGirl93•

I learned that you don't have to buy 100 save the dates with 100 people on the guest list. We really only needed like 45 because most of them were going to couples or families. . .at least I know for the invitation. . . So stupid

18
the_crayon_moose5.07.2016 | North Carolina•

I almost did the same thing. Thankfully I had the lightbulb moment right before ordering...

5
angelkirie5/15/16 Seattle, WA•

Haha, yep! Me too.

2
prettily6.24.17 / minnesota•

I didn't realize this until I saved a nifty guest list spreadsheet that someone here shared, and it has line numbers in case you're numbering RSVPs. the lines only went to about 67; I was confused because I knew we had about 120 people on our list. duh, couples tend to live in the same house!

2
eatmyass_dannydevito•

Um what. So what's the difference between the two then? I always thought they were the same...

12
WoodysHat06.12.2016 - Atlanta, GA•

Here's an Article on the 5 Different Types of Catering Service, but I have no idea how there was a $12,000 difference between the two when the size of the wedding is only 120 ppl. That's a $100 difference per person between stations and buffet style which doesn't make much sense.

Maybe OP meant 1,200? +$10/person I could see. That could easily be the cost of 2 or 3 extra chef assistants and additional setup/display cost.

9
bismuth92•

The reason for the price difference (if I'm right about what they mean by stations) is that with stations, you have a chef at every station (the food is cooked right in front of you) but with a buffet, you just have one chef preparing the food in the kitchen, and then servers bring it out. So the big difference is in staffing costs.

6
_cool_beans_OP3.18.17 | Philly•

Shockingly, it's $12,000, but there are a few things going on. On the original sheet with price per head I got, buffet style started at $110 and stations at $195. Part of it is the chefs, and I think part is that the food is fancier. Stations also fall under their fancier set of packages and come with way more wedding planning assistance and fancier plates/linens etc, and that's built into the price per head. Gratuity was also included in the quote, which is totally acceptable, I just wasn't expecting it. So I suffered major sticker shock when I saw the price, to say the least.

Edit: and by sticker shock, I also mean I thought their original quotes were a bunch of lies and that there were all these extra fees on top, because I thought I was getting the buffet quote that's supposed to start at approx $110. But nope, I just had no idea stations and buffets are different and I accidentally requested a price breakdown of the $195 option.

5
bismuth92•

Reading over it again, I notice OP didn't say stations were $12,000 more than buffet. She said it was $12,000 more than SHE had estimated. So probably a chunk of that is just the initial price shock that we all go through went we start seeing catering quotes.

3
eatmyass_dannydevito•

That lost was really helpful, thank you!

1
TheLadyEve•

I learned that save the dates and invitations are different things that go out at different times. Yes, I know it's ridiculous that I didn't know that before, but I seriously had no idea that invitations went out so soon before the wedding.

I also learned that florists will sometimes take creative license and add in expensive flowers that you didn't ask for--at the 11th hour I was striking gardenias I never knew were being added and saving us hundreds of dollars.

Finally, I learned that it was a HUGE mistake to get a videographer--at least the one we had. Ours was terrible, took 6 months to get the video to us, gave us a video that was too short, and was wayyy too expensive. After a lot of back and forth I got him to release all of the footage to me so I could at least have unedited footage for myself. It was the most infuriating part of the process. I think it would have been fine to just have a photographer and ask our friends to take a few cell phone videos.

11
the_crayon_moose5.07.2016 | North Carolina•

Diamond white is not brighter than white. There are many different creative names for not-white-not-ivory dresses. My veil was white, my dress soft white. My veil glowed like the sun in comparison. Oops.

6
MacaroniCrayon•

We just put up a wedding website that included an Amazon registry. I learned that we know a TON of Internet illiterate people. It's been a nightmare playing tech support to direct people to a simple webpage.

I also learned that we know a lot of just regular illiterate people. The amount of RSVP we got without names, with ought guest numbers, or both (?!) is astounding. Who just ticks a "yes" box and mails it?! There are prompts for your names and your guest count! How does "yes" help me?!

4
Mini_mooseMarried Triad 8/8/15•

I bought 100 invitations for a guest list of 60 people. I only ended up using about 35 of them, and that was because we were printing them ourselves and we had a couple of rough drafts before the final invitation. Most of them went to couples and families with small children.

This wouldn't have been such a shit mistake if it wasn't that special seeded, hand made paper. I could have cut invitation costs in half if I had been thinking.

3
bohlkt•

That my future husband wants no part of it. (Me either).

2
ObsidianRose•

My biggest surprize was learning that there is a list of 'allowed' places for civil weddings to happen. I thought you could just rock up to a forest or something with a celebrant and get married there. We have a choice of about 10 venues in our county and all but 2 of them are £6000+ hotels, which is more than our whole budget. Good thing we like the other two!

2