I Have A Question On Vendor Charges

[MichelleT]

I have been working on pulling together all of the vendors I will need for my February 2015 wedding in Cabo I had a question.  First of all knew having a wedding in Cabo would expensive, but it is still cheaper than having a wedding locally at home.  I chose an AI (Sandos Finisterra) to save on some of the food, and drink costs so that I could add some extra personal touches to have my wedding the way I envisioned it would be and I absolutely love all of the vendors I have chosen.  However, I am having some serious sticker shock with the 15% delivery, 18% gratuity and 16% taxes that I am seeing quite of the few of the vendors tack on to the already expensive prices.  It seems like all of the extras with the vendors make the prices 50% + higher than the price of the quoted services.  I guess my question is, are others running into all of these extras (I know 16% tax is a given in Mexico), but 18% gratuity in advance, 15% delivery fees, 15% design fees are all of these fees pretty much customary in Cabo?

Edited August 5, 2014 by MichelleT

[LisaAnthonyPoppy]

Yes I have found the same true for Playa Del Carmen. Maybe they think we will pay it or we are rich who knows. But I have eliminated the headache by making do without.

[hyoungquist]

@@Michelle T - I commented on another one of your posts as well (getting married at the Finisterrra June 2015). If you haven't talked to Lupita already, the resort also charges a $250 outside vendor fee for each vendor you will be bringing on site. I would highly recommend finding other weddings that just used the Finisterra exclusively for all of their vendors. In their highest package (which I think is $3,700 in 2015) the only thing that really isn't included is the photographer. We have a friend that is a professional photographer that we are planning on coming down for 4 days and offered to pay for her flight and hotel (less then $1000) and we don't have to pay an outside vendor fee because she is considered a wedding guest. All of the floral arrangements that the resort has done that I have seen have been beautiful and they can work with pretty much whatever you are wanting. They have a cupcake vendor on site that makes BEAUTIFUL cupcakes if you were wanting to go with something other then a basic cake. I was even thinking of having them do a small cake for us and then cupcakes for the guests and I can make cupcake toppers to take down there and have them use. This package even includes a DJ which I haven't heard any reviews on but our plan is to make a playlist on an ipod and just have them play those songs so that we know that we will be having the exact music that we want. A lot of our guests plan on staying for an entire week and are responsible for their own travel arrangements. The resort is within walking distance to town so no need to hire transportation (everyone is coming in at different times and taking care of their own transportation to the hotel which is typically $50 for shared or $100 for private to stop at Walmart or Costco). Lupita can even plan a "welcome/rehearsal dinner" for you at no extra cost since the resort is all inclusive. We are estimating that with the wedding, our own travel arrangements, STD's, invitations, welcome bags, decorations (keeping it simple as the background is beautiful!) and spending money for while we are there, we will probably be looking at somewhere around $10,000. Just to book a venue where we live in California is a minimum of $5k and includes NOTHING but a site so we think getting married in Cabo is a great deal and can't wait for our family and friends to see why we love it there (we go every summer).

[MichelleT]

@@hyoungquist, thank you for the information.  I actually understand the vendor fees, but we are using Linens and Things which Lupita recomended for our decorations.  The resort does not include all of the flowers (we need 5 centerpiece, my bouquet, 5 bridesmaid bouquets, 7 boutineers, and a mothers corsage), so I am having Cabo Floral studios do our personal flowers and having the resort do the centerpieces.  We are having a guitarist, Arturo Sotomayer, come in for cocktail hour, and we are using Susan Morel for our hair and makeup.  It also looks like we are going to have around 60 guests (all are staying at the resort), which will run us about 3,000 over the 3,500 we paid for the sunset package (we reserved last November before the price increase to the 2015 prices).  I think we are going to run about a total of 25k-27k for our wedding as I paid for travel for our 4 kids and 2 of their boyfriends, so we ended up paying for 8 of us to travel (9K).  Which is not bad as I am also in California, and the venues are far more expensive than Mexico.  My original post was asking about the taxes, and all of the additional fees, as I wanted to make sure these fees were customary in Mexico, as it seemed funny to pay almost a 50% uplift on all services.  In CA we usually pay about 30% over with the taxes and gratuities.  I have been in contact with Lupita quite a bit since our wedding is on Feburary 14, 2015 which is less than 6 months away.  We are using the Palapa on the beach, the DJ and the photographer which was recomended by Lupita (however, I have not paid until I can see some of their work). 

Edited August 25, 2014 by MichelleT

[hyoungquist]

@@MichelleT I took a look at the photographer and personally was not too impressed. If you need a recommendation, Sara Richardson looks great and has many featured weddings on Style Me Pretty and has a great website with her portfolio. I have seen the vendor charge + 16% tax when I have inquired on things and check with the vendor to see if they include the vendor charge in their proposal. I have seen some other people had luck with it being covered.

[YOLIM2016]

Ladies can you give me some feed back on both of your experience with the sandos wedding? Any recommendations or tips you can offer me?

[deannawozniak]

I would love some feed back from both of you on your experience with Sandos. I'm looking to book with them for a Nov 2016 wedding. Thanks!

[jazzzy23]

@deannawozniak  Hello!  Have you decided on a venue for your wedding?  I am also looking into Sandos, Casada Dorada, and Fiesta Americana.  I would love any insight you may have.  Thank you!