It is a question that vexes many brides every year and that is how much should you set aside for your wedding favors within your wedding budget.  Whilst much of the initial wedding planning sees decisions being made about venues, guest lists and when the wedding should be, wedding favors are often one of the last details to be decided upon.

Wedding favors are an important element of your wedding day.  Intended as tokens of thanks to their wedding guests by the bride and groom, they do not need to be anything special or expensive, but they do need to coordinate with the wedding style and say something about the style and personality of the bride and groom.

One problem that does become apparent later in the wedding planning is that the initial figure set down in the wedding budget is woefully inadequate and the couple must now stretch what money they have left to make sure they can meet the cost.  Research and accurate calculations will make sure that this does not happen, but you need to address you wedding favors when you first make out your wedding budget.

Go online and check out the range of favors available and the prices from wedding favor stores.  You will find that most of the bigger stores will stock the same favors so do a little price comparison to find out which offer the best value for money.  Many stores will also offer extra incentives such as free shipping on orders over a certain amount and discount codes when you join their site or sign up for the newsletter.  If you are planning a big wedding then check out the bulk pricing for large quantities and seek out some wholesalers for even cheaper deals.

At this stage you are unlikely to know which favors you will want to buy, so it is more useful to stick within a price range.  You also need to think about the cost of packaging, decorations and thank you tags, as well as shipping costs and taxes.  All of these things should be considered within the price range you can afford.

Having only just written up your guest list you will not yet know how many of your guests will be coming.  There are some calculations you can do based on typical numbers of rejections but it is probably safer to include everyone in your initial budget at this stage.  The best way to come up with a realistic figure for your favors is by working on a price per guest basis, this should include the favor, the packaging, a sum for decorations and tags, shipping and taxes.

When you finally get around to purchasing your wedding favors you will probably need to adjust this figure based in the number of confirmed guests you have.  It can also be wise to include around 10% extra to cover any late invites and to perhaps send to those who couldn’t make it.  If you need to claw back money within your budget then you wedding favors could come to the rescue, or alternatively you can up the amount you spend per favor and go for something more expensive than you originally budgeted for.