DP1andDP2

Thanks--I am so flattered! Please feel free to use any of the content I have on my website. Cheers.

Oh! $1300 for 5 nights and air is a good deal. Congrats! I need to work with your agent lol. It will be a great experience for you and your family. My maids and I spent some time hyping up the resort and we put together a fun itinerary for folks.

Hey Katie, I totally understand that this can be overwhelming and you want to consider your guests. At first we thought a destination wedding would be too pricey--but we kept reminding ourselves that we want a SMALL wedding and we chose PPR because it is a bit more expensive and that would deter some folks. I know that sounds cruel. $2600 seems a bit pricey--even for Omaha. We found that travel agents (we called about five different ones) tended to give us inflated package deals (flight, hotel, transfer). So we opted to do the following: 1. We negotiated a $50 room deposit and actually collected the deposits from our guests via paypal. That gave us extra negotiating power because we came to the table with enough $ and a firm commitment for 30 rooms. That also meant that we did not come out of pocket. It took some work on the front end but it was worth it. If you want to do this I can give you more advice. 2. We set up our website and gave folks as much info as possible on rates and airlines. See www.derrickandanita.com 3. We told folks to book their own flights. By going this route we have so far saved on average $250-$300 per ticket from LA and DC to PUJ. It may be different from Omaha so I may be wrong--do research before you sign a contract that includes flights because most agents want to lock in people for 5 nights. We found that some guests-- because of money or the amount of time off from work wanted to only stay 3 nights--so it's best to let people choose whether they wanted to stay 3 nights or 7. You can negotiate the room rate for 3+ nights. Anyone staying under 3 nights may have to pay the regular rate. 4. Early on we knew that we wanted a minimum price to attend our wedding from the East Coast. That was $1200. That $1200 covers at least 3 nights and airfare. So that meant no more than $540 (3 nights/2 pax/room) for the hotel and the remaining $660 for airfare. We chose a time of year with lower hotel and air rates--Again--Omaha is quite different from a coastal city. 5. These days with access to the internet, I find that folks can find better flight deals than an agent can offer. Sites like Skyscanner are a starting point. My bridesmaids help communicate to guests when there are good deals on tickets. 6. You may want to focus on VIPs. We talked with our essential family members to see how much they could afford and that's how we came to the $1200. We negotiated rates for our VIPs--we have extra rooms at the special rates for non-VIPs--and there is no penalty for canceling the rooms 60 or 90 days before--I can't remember. I hope this helps. I wish someone had explained this to me last summer. Once you've confirmed a date and location you will feel a lot better. You may also find out if there are any caribbean countries that have direct flights from Omaha. Just an idea.

I am having a low key bachelorette party at the resort. We are doing this because everyone is long distance! I live in LA and most of my wedding party and family is in Washington, DC and Baltimore. I wanted to have something low-key and (somewhat) memorable. We are calling it a "Pink Party with the Bride" for me and "Cigars and Cognac with the Groom" for my fiance (I think he is having a bachelor party in Vegas so this is just something for the guys to do). So, for the Pink Party we are inviting guests to wear VS Pink or comfy pink (colored) clothing. We are hosting it in a suite and we will have sparkling cider, champagne and desserts. I don't know what's going on other than that my maids are planning the rest:)

THANK YOU ANGEL!!!! You are a blessing. I've been searching on YouTube to find a PPR reception at Olympus Terrace--your photos give me a good idea of the space. FYI PPR Brides--if you search for "paradisus palma real wedding" on YouTube you can find wedding videos. My favorite is Melvin and Zeneta's Domininican Republic Destination Wedding"

Very cool. They are so creative. Beautiful!!!

These are DIY invitations we did. We used a Groupon for Vistaprint for the printing and a good friend is a crafter and she and I did the "seal" which is a laminated sheet (the material sequins are made of) embossed with an African batik pattern and hand painted. Each one is different as you can see. The cards are stacked under the invitation. Cheers.

Dear Katie, This is a late response with regards to your hotel choice. My fiance and I originally reserved and put a deposit down at Paradisus Punta Cana. I freaked out after reading some reviews on Trip Advisor about construction and other things we wanted to change to Palma Real--it was no problem. We transfered the deposit, but we had to choose another date. After changing we actually got the 6 pm wedding we originally wanted and we got a more luxurious hotel (granted some of the recent posts about the roaches is problematic). In terms of a travel agent--I have a really great one. She is flexible, she contacts the guests for me and checks in with me via email quite often. Jennifer Gabriel Dreamers Travel [email protected] Office: 410-239-9424 Toll Free: 877-249-9424 Fax: 410-374-6400 In case you have not hired an agent, I recommend you shop around. My fiance contacted quite a few agents to find out who had the best rates and the best offers for us. You can use the Romance Wedding Package for rooms offered by the folks in Miami as a template. For example: we negotiated children 4 and under are free and free transfers to and from the hotel among other things.

I wish I was creative enough to figure out a theme. I watch tons of wedding shows but I am at a loss. Your ideas sound so creative! James Bond is hot stuff! That's quite brilliant actually--luxurious/mysterious yet fun and bold. My fi and I went to see Skyfall the other night--it was awesome. In terms of color schemes my favorite color is green--I watched a David Tutera episode and he claimed that green was the worst color for a wedding LOL. So I tried to change it to purple or something more traditional. After trying on dresses with my bridesmaids I decided to go back to green--the dresses are a fern with gold foil. So I guess our wedding palate is fern, gold and chocolate. I think it's missing a color though. Any ideas? We want to have eco-chic wedding with some African fabric accents. I haven't figured out how to incorporate other African accents without it coming off as safari themed--not cool. How can I put unique touches on my wedding without it being cheesy?!? Any ideas?

Quick question. Will DJ Mania and the onsite photographer contact me via email? I was originally booked at Paradisus Punta Cana and those folks were proactive. Both the onsite photographer and the DJ sent me price lists--it was all unsolicited. If anyone has their email addresses please post them. I just got the email address for the person that coordinates the bridal suite and spa services. Cheers!

Thanks much for the email address of the person that books the bridal suite and spa treatments.

I actually came across friends that assumed that because the wedding was at an all-inclusive resort that the wedding reception would be free--because food and drinks are included in a guests stay. I think there is a misperception that destination weddings at all-inclusive resorts are very cheap or free and that guests have paid to attend your reception--little do they know that it's like paying twice for dinner.

Thanks so much for posting the letter. It's a good point that in order to fully participate in the wedding activities people have to be present at the resort! Adding this to my bank of bride wisdom.

Dear MariDr2012! I hope you and your family are safe after the Hurricane Sandy disaster. You are a genius!!! My FI and I have carefully read through your post and are going to use your A and B list strategy and post the off resort guest fee to the website. Luckily we sent out the STDs to our A list only a few months ago--whew!!!! You have really calmed my fears. Congrats your big day is almost here!!!

If you find a way around the $1000 fee for outside photographers, please let me know. Another option that I know of is bringing a photographer from overseas who is staying at the hotel. The fee is waived if the photographer is a guest. I hope this helps. My FI and I are considering the option to bring a photographer from the U.S.

Whether or not to invite children was a discussion my FI and I had. We wanted to have the wedding at an adults only resort but after consulting with our siblings we decided to choose a family resort. The compromise was... We are inviting children to the ceremony, but the cocktail hour and reception are adults only. We are providing childcare, a cousin will watch the children in a suite. We'll have video games, movies and room service pizza. Depending on the number of children, we may hire a sitter to help out. The hotel provides childcare so we can request someone to come for a few hours.

For Terrihug: My FI and I reserved 7 extra rooms for our family that just could not get themselves together in time:) We have an agreement with the TA that if the rooms were not reserved by a certain date (120 days before the wedding) that the rooms would be released (we would give up the reservation for those rooms) and the money we put down for the unused (and used) deposits would be credited toward our room--like a refund. It all depends on if your TA is willing to hold on to the rooms for you. For the deposits, we did things a bit differently (advice for other brides). I actually collected the deposits from our close friends and family via PayPal and check. We then negotiated our group terms with the TA and then gave her deposits along with the guest database.

I have an etiquette question. If this is addressed in another thread, please let me know. There is an extra fee for guests attending the wedding but staying off the resort. Here is my dilemma, the fee is $35--not that bad. But, when added to the per person rate of $70 the total cost becomes $105 pp for off resort guests. Not cool for me:) I think asking ppl who decide to stay off the resort to PAY attend my wedding is inappropriate (tacky). There have been family members that have complained about the cost of the resort (despite us negotiating great rates) and want to stay at timeshares or other resorts. There is a strong possibility that families on my FI's side will invite themselves--YES! I said 'invite themselves' to our wedding and show up to the resort. I've already had people not invited to the wedding claim that they are making travel arrangements to attend. My questions: Is it appropriate to ask where people are lodging on the RSVP? If so, how should that be worded? How do I deal with people who have invited themselves to the wedding--especially since they have made or are making travel arrangements? I can imagine that their logic is "I'm paying to travel to your wedding, how can you not invite me?" This poses a problem for guests who are staying at other resorts/timeshares. There resort requests the number of off resort guests prior to the wedding date so that they can invoice us.

Even though I have not had my wedding yet, I do recommend Paradisus. I just met with a friend that attended a wedding there and he raved about it! In response to Ev. I just want to clarify my subjective experience with the folks in Miami. I was told that my original RP contact was no longer a Romance Planner and a new planner had taken over (for example the new planner is using the original RP's old email address). So there was a reshuffling of people that they called a "restructuring." That was out of the norm for them. As a constructive suggestion...I think there are too many people coordinating different things at Paradisus. I don't expect things to go smoothly while planning a wedding 3000 miles away, but I do expect some sort of streamlining of the process. I've talked to a few travel agents that plan destination weddings and they were surprised that Paradisus had me in contact with (1) Romance Planner (2) Groups TA (3) Event Planners in Punta Cana (who are absolutely wonderful by the way). In full disclosure we booked our wedding at two different resorts before we narrowed it down and with the other resort, which was not nearly as nice as PPR, there was once point person at the resort for everything. The process with the other resort seemed simpler and transparent. We cancelled that reservation and decided to go with PPR after reading other threads on PPR. I also want to mention that we have expressed these concerns to the folks in Miami--so I'm not just using this as a forum to vent

Hey Erica12, My fiance and I are getting married a few days before we leave. We are getting the license from the circuit court a few weeks before--in Maryland you have 6 months to get it signed. We will exchange vows in the pastor's quarters on Monday. He will sign the license and then we will file it. Get married Monday, leave for PC Wednesday, have ceremony Saturday. I hope I have this right! Whew!

Hey Angel, I understand all of your questions, I had a lot of them myself. I found that after I contacted the Romance Planner in Miami, a lot of the questions were answered. They will send you a number of documents for your review. Whatever, I'm about to tell you make sure your check it out for yourself to confirm:) Room rates. I am getting married at PPR next July and it appears that the room rates are lower at the end of summer and early fall because it's closer to hurricane season. I feel that we have great rates--the lowest I've seen. TA vs no TA. This is your choice. You can book a group rate directly with PPR in Miami. We chose to go with a travel agent that specializes in destination weddings. We talked to 5 different agents in Maryland and DC and had a list of questions for them. We ultimately went with the agent that was the most responsive and offered the best deal. The TA was very important because we want our guests to work with someone who is friendly and highly organized. For example our TA is including airport transfers for no extra fee, our TA met the rates of the PPR, we can cancel rooms up to 60 days before with no penalty, the TA sends personalized invoices to our guests along with payment plans etc. The PPR people in Miami were not very helpful in terms of these services. Photographer. We are not sure yet. My fiance is leaning toward bringing a photographer from the U.S. The cost of a 3 night stay and airfare will be about the same as the highest package from Arrecife (if I recall). It all depends on what we can afford. Videographer. My cousin is a professional videographer. We are bartered to pay for her stay in exchange for a short video. When you go in January, you may want to book the Entice Me offer. The hotel stay is deducted from the total cost of your wedding if you book at PPR. Talk to the romance planner before you book for details. We chose Chill Out Chic. You can add whatever event you want. You can add a welcome dinner or private cocktail party. When you get the budget calculator it lists almost everything you can think of--including the things in the Tailor Made package. Good Luck.

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