SimpleBliss

Hello, I am reconsidering having my wedding on an all-inclusive resort thanks to advice/information provided to me on the forum! Can anyone name a few resorts that allow outside vendors i.e. being able to hire your own photographer, flowers, cake or DJ without being charged an arm and a leg for it? If its a day pass they require to enter the facility, if you can provide the price that would be great. I would like to compile a list of these vendor friendly resorts. P.S. If my guests are off-resort are they allowed to come to my wedding or would they have to pay another fee to enter? Maybe I can just get around some of these "policies" by inviting my photographer and DJ as "our guests". P.S. Looking for specifically resorts in the Playa Del Carmen area.

The $5000 - $10000 budget does not include airfare costs (which is probabely going to be $700/pp coming from Calgary/Toronto/Edmonton) The reason why I don't like All Inclusives Resort because I feel I won't be staying on the resort much to benefit from their amenities. We are big foodies and prefer to go out to town to eat and try new things and like going to the odd hole in the wall restaurant that serves awesome delicious food! In addition, I heard many resorts push you to have their own photographers+make up artist and would charge you for outside vendor fees. I would prefer to have control over using my own photographer of choice as pictures are very important to me and my own make-up artist. I am amazed that you managed to have $6000 budget for AI and 60 guests attending!? I would love to see your budget breakdown on your wedding because it's giving me a glimmer of hope that mine might be doable.

Hello everyone! I am very glad to join the community here. I am in the midst of planning my own wedding set tentatively for April 2016 in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico. Duration of our stay would be 5 days and 4 nights as my fiance cannot get anymore days off. Not planning to have anything too formal and all-inclusive resorts are not our thing. Our top two priorities are Food and Photography. Decor would be minimal, especially when you have the ocean as your background. Through my research and price quotes I am getting discouraged that planning a destination wedding with under 20 guests is not possible for my small budget of $5000 - $10000. (Everyone is pretty much paying their own flights and accommodations to get there). Just wondering if any other brides were able to pull this off with that amount. I am looking to have a semi-private to private beach ceremony. The reception could either be at the same venue or at a villa where my family and I would be staying at (this means we would need to hire catering) If not we could all just go out to a nice restaurant to have dinner? Any feedback or advice would be greatly appreciated!