This is kinda funny. Our reception back home (the wedding itself was an extremely intimate thing with only a dozen attendees partly because it was a destination wedding), had well over 300 people, but I think our costs were only about $2,000 for the whole thing, which included the destination ceremony and plane tickets.
My wife and I have close ties to our community, and lots of close friends, and my wife's family is large and tightly knit.
Anyway, a big reason our costs ended up so low was because of the size of the wedding. People donated food, services, time, equipment and everything else. If we simply paid for it all, it probably would have cost closer to an average American wedding.
With gifts, we ended up making money on the wedding. Not much, but enough to start our younger selves off nicely.
My wife and I have close ties to our community, and lots of close friends, and my wife's family is large and tightly knit.
Anyway, a big reason our costs ended up so low was because of the size of the wedding. People donated food, services, time, equipment and everything else. If we simply paid for it all, it probably would have cost closer to an average American wedding.
With gifts, we ended up making money on the wedding. Not much, but enough to start our younger selves off nicely.