THE stress of paying for a wedding often overshadows the joy of the big day – luckily, one bride has shared some tricks that could save you thousands.
A newlywed couple saved over $10,000 on their wedding day in July by hunting for deals at stores like Costco and discovering a credit card hack that allowed them to go on their honeymoon for free.
TikTok user Shayna Webb, 22, has amassed over 32K followers on the app by sharing wedding hacks that saved her and her now-husband, Cameron, from breaking the bank while planning their wedding.
The biggest money-saving trick that the couple found was using a Chase Sapphire credit card for all of their big purchases to rack up reward points – and then spending the points on a huge, luxurious honeymoon in the Dominican Republic.
"We literally got an all-inclusive adults-only resort for completely free," Shayna told the U.S. Sun.
"A lot of people in my comments are like, 'There's no way it was completely free' – but we didn't pay a single dollar for our honeymoon besides the flights."
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Shayna says that the couple paid off the credit card's huge purchases like the venue, the wedding dress, and more by using their set wedding budget.
But that's not the only way the couple saved money – they found creative ways to DIY necessary details and kept an eagle eye out for sales.
For her bridal outfit, Shayna got her wedding dress at a huge biyearly stock sale at a local bridal outlet.
To complete the look, Shayna got plain white heels from a secondhand store and decorated them by gluing on pearls from Amazon. The final cost of the shoes was only $17.
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Shayna cut costs on more outfits by buying her rehearsal dinner and bridal shower outfits on Black Friday weekend, as well as the bridesmaids' dresses and gifts.
The couple also saved money on their wedding photos by booking their photographer with another Black Friday weekend deal – meaning that their pictures were half off.
PRINTS
While Shayna was hard at work on Black Friday weekend, she also found a cheap option for Save the Dates on design platform Canva, which offered 100 Save the Date cards for only $20.
Months later, she ordered her wedding invitations from Costco's photo center for only $0.66 per invite.
The bride says in a TikTok video that the invites "came in about a week and saved us hundreds of dollars because they can get so expensive."
VENUE
When it came time to book a venue, Shayna learned that Saturdays are usually the most expensive days to book.
"I would just say, anything that you can do on days besides Saturday – do it."
The couple planned an entire weekend for their friends and family to celebrate the marriage by spending time together before finishing off the weekend with a Sunday wedding.
Simply moving their wedding back one day ended up saving them about $1,000.
FLORALS
For the flowers decorating the venue, the couple decided to save money by DIY-ing all of the floral arrangements with fake flowers except for the bride and bridal party's bouquets.
Rather than paying around $3,000 from a florist's quote, Shayna and her mother took to Hobby Lobby every other week for their 50% off sale.
It only cost the crafty bride $900 to decorate her entire venue, including 27 tables, with gorgeous, fake flowers.
CAKE
One of the most surprising parts of the wedding planning process is when Shayna and Cameron went to Publix for a free wedding cake sampling – and ended up with three full cakes.
"I was expecting one little slice of cake," Shayna said.
"But no, they gave us three big cakes. One vanilla, one chocolate, and one marble."
Shayna advises other couples: "Even if you might not get your cake from Publix, you should at least do wedding cake testing from there because they give you three free cakes."
The Webbs ended up using Publix for the cake given out at their reception but bought sheet cake for their guests as it's a cheaper option than the standard tiered cake.
'MEMORIES ARE GREATER'
The bride said that while sharing her advice on TikTok has been amazing, she has to remember to not get wrapped up in the little things.
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"I just feel like wedding TikTok can kind of consume people when they get engaged and you just find yourself comparing your wedding to other weddings," Shayna said.
"The memories are greater than the price."
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