How far out

[WebLady]

How far in advance of your wedding did you (or do you plan to) book your location(s)?

I am helping my FSIL gets plans together for a wedding in July this year; July 5th to be exact. Now as a planner/photographer I always suggested people book about 6 months out.

So we are a little over 5 mos out from the July 5th date; plus that is a holiday weekend! But I don't know if they will have the money to book the place they want for a couple more months. Plus my brother hasn't seen it and he won't be able to until mid march when he graduates basic training and comes home.

I am just not sure how to suggest they proceed here.

[WebLady]

Oh No ... I just found an online calendar for the place they were wanting and it is booked already for July 5th -- So I guess we need to keep looking

Man, I wish I had thought to look and check for a calendar or call first before getting her hopes up :rain:

[dawsmi]

My advice is that as soon as they find a place that they fall in love with, Book it!! I wish I had booked my church when we first decided on our date because when we went to book it there was already another wedding booked for that date! So instead of having our wedding at 2pm like we originally planned we have to have it at noon because they booked it for 2. The sooner you book the easier it will make the rest of the plans go!! Good luck!!

[TangoWedding]

We booked ours 11 months out...and they were already filling up. :notsure:

[BrideInCuffs21]

Well I got engaged in November of 2006 and in December 2006 we had booked the location.... our wedding is Oct 08 so about 2 years in advanced... the place we are having it is pretty popular and he already had weddings booked for 09!!!

[Layla08]

My wedding is in a little under 9 months and we still haven't booked a venue yet! LOL

[erika85]

I had to book the reception hall more than 20 months out!

(we weren't actually engaged yet, but he doesn't need to know that):frogg:

When I went looking for places for FSILs reception 2 years ago everything in town was booked solid for 10 months out!!! (Keep in mind there is more than 6 locations in a town of only 24,000)

[KMS]

We booked our location about 11 months from the date. We were actually rushed to make a decision because the January dates were beginning to fill.

[frenchie]

I think it really depends on the season, on the location and all. I generally hear that it's safest to book a year in advance for summer weddings.

I booked about 5 months in advance and that worked fine for me, but then again I'm having a winter wedding.

[Danielle9608]

I booked 20 months out. When I toured my venue in November 2006 there was no open spots for all of 2007.

[HisMuse]

The first thing I did was book the place and that was more than a year before the wedding but then I did everything really early...that's how I roll.

[shawnsgirl]

If we had a et date in mind for the venue we decided on we would have had to have booked it 15 months in advance. That's how fast they fill up even in a rural area like mine. We ended up booking 11 months prior to our wedding, but we had to go by what was available. In October of 2006 June, July, and August and all but labor day weekend was booked at the hotel where we had our reception. Good Luck!!

[WebLady]

Wow I am surprised to hear how many people booked a year or more in advance. Most commonly I had seen/heard of was 6-9 mos out.

Yeah, I don't know what my brother and FSIL are going to do.

[ikkin510]

The church we didn't really have to worry about. It's a small church and they only really ever end up having one wedding a year there. I think we called and talked to the pastor about it in March for our October wedding.
The reception hall, we called them in Novermber but they were not accepting bookings for July and later until January. So we booked that then.

[dawsmi]

We were forced to book ASAP because we started planning in October of 2007 and we are getting married March 15 2008! So we booked our venues in October! So we booked 5 months in advance!!

[Brian's Bride]

We booked about 12 months in advance. We were engaged May 07 and places were booking up for May 08! Our reception venue has two rooms (upstairs and downstairs). While we were touring the upstairs location, the lady took a phone call and booked the downstairs for the same date we were looking at! So we settled for the upstairs, although it was disappointing because the downstairs was bigger... but we're still happy with our choice.

[Whitewater]

We're booking as far in advance (and that means money and signed contracts!!!) as the location will let us. We're having an outdoor wedding in June -- booking early is where it's at! It's a stroke of luck for me that our wedding date is on a Wedesday, a lot of people who are already booked for the weekends on either side (yes, already . . . ) have Wed. free.

Our ceremony location won't let us book until AUGUST 1st of this year!!! That's less than a year out! You better believe that I will be up at the crack of dawn ready to call the city offices at 8am to reserve my wedding day!!! While our location isn't mentioned anywhere (neither online nor in local wedding guides/magazines or anywhere, really) as being a 'popular spot' it's always wise to take no chances!

But still, how wierd is that? Even DisneyWorld will let us book our honeymoon 12 months in advance. That means that the first thing we'll reserve is our honeymoon hotel, hah hah :)

Still haven't found anywhere to have the reception, though. But when we do, we'll book it as far in advance as we can!


Whitewater