Hotel wedding packages

amberlindsay

Hi all,

I am pretty new to this wedding planning malarkey and so hoping someone may have some helpful suggestions or recommendations. We're looking to get married on a Friday next March/April in Cambridgeshire, but we're completely undecided on venues and whether their prices are worth it - I've been trawling the internet forever and have finally decided to ask you nice people for help!!

We're looking for more of a package hotel deal (ceremony room, wedding breakfast with usual drinks to toast and on arrival, buffet and disco etc). The hope is we will pay one lump sum for the essential wedding day stuff and then go cheap on everything else (decorations, cake, photos etc) - but I'm unsure what prices to expect for a package such as this.

I've found a deal at the Hotel Felix (hotelfelix.com) in Cambridge, but not sure if it's value for money - we haven't set our budget yet, but know that £4k or £5k is our limit for the package. :eek: (say it fast and it isn't scary lol).

The cost is £4200 for 40 people to attend in the day and 20 more at night. For extra guests in the day, you have to add £65 pp and £10 pp for the evening - which for us to invite everyone we want, would cost £5k in total. For this you get:

-Hire of gazebo or indoor ceremony room
-sparkling wine on arrival
-3 course wedding breakfast with white linen and napkins
-Half bottle of wine pp with meal
-sparkling wine to toast
-cake stand/knife
-hot buffet for evening
-private bar
-disco provided
-Honeymoon suite
-3 rooms for night of wedding to be used by chosen guests

I know that a lot of package prices are dependent on location, and Cambridge being Cambridge; it's not the cheapest - but your thoughts on whether this price is typical, good or bad would be really appreciated! :A

Thanks everyone!

PS: If you have any other recommendations for venues in the area; I'd love to hear them :T

floss2

Look for a Barcelo hotel - we have all bar the 3 guest rooms plus photographer & album, candelabra, table plan, master of ceremonies for £2,500, for exactly the same numbers.

mrscoles2be

Hi. A hotel near me in East Sussex does a £999 package!! :eek:
That includes:
(for 50 people)
Sparkling wine or pimms on arrival
3 course wedding breakfast with wine
Toastmaster
DJ for 4 hours
Evening buffet for up to 70 people
Accomodation for the bride and groom
Discount room rates for other guests

I've been to a wedding there too and it was really nice!
I saw this package online after our wedding was all booked!! And was gutted as its sooo much cheaper than ours!! LOL

But I guess it depends on what area you're in etc

Plans_all_plans

I think your venue looks very nice. But, I think you should be able to get it a bit cheaper.

We got engaged this Feb and are getting married this July so we've managed to get things cheaper/thrown in for free cos it's a Friday wedding and we're doing it quickly, so my experience may not be typical if you have a long time til the wedding.

We are in the North and have got for £4700:

108 guests (just 4 of them children) for a 3 course sit down meal, plus coffee, linen etc included
125 overall for evening buffet
Reception room hire at hotel (we're having a Church wedding)
3 bottles of wine per table
DJ
Cake stand/knife
Private bar
Bridal suite
Guests rate at hotel for those coming to our wedding
Hotel also provides a car to take us to Church and then onto reception for Friday weddings

We managed to negotiate with them, even though the wedding co-ordinator said they wouldn't move on the prices/do deals when I first asked. We eventually got a £5 per head reduction in cost of wedding breakfast, £2 off per head on buffet and they said that they'd undercater for us on the buffet too, we got the bridal suite thrown in for free, got £150 off the room hire and got £20 off the cost per room for our guests.

All these things the hotel do not usually do, so we were pleased to get them cheaper. The original quote to us was coming in at a good bit over 5k.

My advice to you is to say to your chosen venue that another hotel has quoted you in the region of X for a similar/better package and you would like to know what they can do to reduce the differential between the venues. When they say they can't do anything, ask again. I just kept asking til they said they could get close to what the other hotel quoted. Good luck.

Edited to add: we were told by the hotel's house manager that the drinks on arrival prove to be unnecessary as most of the men don't drink sparkling wine and head straight to the bar for a pint and some of the women do the same (for a G&T not a pint!), so you could maybe ask them how much they'd reduce the price if they didn't do arrival drinks.

morwenna

floss2 wrote: »

Look for a Barcelo hotel - we have all bar the 3 guest rooms plus photographer & album, candelabra, table plan, master of ceremonies for £2,500, for exactly the same numbers.

Fantastic venue Floss, I wouldn't have guessed you could get that in there for under 10k :T

Emma82_2

mrscoles2be wrote: »

Hi. A hotel near me in East Sussex does a £999 package!! :eek:
That includes:
(for 50 people)
Sparkling wine or pimms on arrival
3 course wedding breakfast with wine
Toastmaster
DJ for 4 hours
Evening buffet for up to 70 people
Accomodation for the bride and groom
Discount room rates for other guests

I've been to a wedding there too and it was really nice!
I saw this package online after our wedding was all booked!! And was gutted as its sooo much cheaper than ours!! LOL

But I guess it depends on what area you're in etc

Interesting.. What's the name of the hotel? Sounds like a good deal and hopefully wouldn't be too far from me as I live in Kent.

frannyann

http://www.theroyalcambridgehotel.co.uk/


They are offering a wedding in 2010 for £2010, sure you could haggle to get it for that price in 2011!

frannyann

Emma82 wrote: »

Interesting.. What's the name of the hotel? Sounds like a good deal and hopefully wouldn't be too far from me as I live in Kent.

This is not far from Tunbridge Wells, so 'just' outside kent and is part of the Old English Inn group who are doing £999 wedding package.

http://www.theroebuck.co.uk/weddings.htm

I drive past it a lot, its a lovely place and we considered it ourselves. It in the Ashdown forest.

floss2

morwenna wrote: »

Fantastic venue Floss, I wouldn't have guessed you could get that in there for under 10k :T

Neither did we! We went to a very costly wedding at a Barcelo in Cheshire last year and were stunned at the cost of the local one's "All Wrapped Up" package

How're you getting on? Not so long now!!

mrscoles2be

Emma82... the hotel I posted about is in Rye... its called The River Haven Hotel.
They are not part of any group... just a privately owned hotel... very nice!
Hope this helps

Emma82_2

mrscoles2be wrote: »

Emma82... the hotel I posted about is in Rye... its called The River Haven Hotel.
They are not part of any group... just a privately owned hotel... very nice!
Hope this helps

That's great, thanks very much. I'll check it out