photo by @WilliamsPhotography
From April through September is considered an off-season wedding in New Zealand, this means you can save some cash when booking your wedding between these months, but there are some things to consider.
Hotels and Accommodations
With off-season months, comes awesome discounts on accommodation. Hotels are famous for dropping the prices and even creating combo packages that can save you up to 20% on the accommodation costs. Let’s not forget other accommodations services such as Air B&Bs, private luxury accommodation hire, and more, you can usually find some great deals when making bookings with off-season weddings.
Video Above by @Eureka Films
Flights & Car hire
Fewer tourists mean more available seats and cars for hire which results in cheaper flights options and transportation within New Zealand.
However, in some odd years, we might experience high demand of tourists during peak ski season so cheaper flights are not always available.
Photo By @Fallonphotography
Wedding Vendors
While there are not many discounts with good wedding photographers & wedding videographers, you expect to find great promotions when looking at wedding planner services, wedding car hire, wedding flowers, venue hire such as for the reception, and more. There is a risk of your preferred wedding vendor not being available during winter, simply because some wedding vendors take holidays during the quiet months, so while there are great possibilities there are also risks.
photography & videography are services that couples need to watch out for, simply because cheap doesn’t mean good for these cases, many times, couples book cheap vendors only to find themselves with unexperienced vendors with unprofessional products, after your wedding, all you have is the photos & videos so we recommend you choose well as those images are forever.
The good, the bad, and the ugly
yes, it’s true that you can save some money during these offseasons months but before we help make a decision, we need first to understand why off-season is so unpopular among wedding couples.
During this times, while some areas like ski benefit from the increased tourism, many tourists that are not interested in winter activities prefer to visit New Zealand in the warmer months such as Spring and Summer, that’s one of the reasons we see a decline in weddings during those times, in addition, the cold is a big factor (July is usually the coldest month), with many weddings in New Zealand especially in Queenstown & Wanaka (most popular wedding destinations) being held in the south island, this means that winter in those locations are a little colder, especially with Heli weddings being almost a must in those mountains. While you will be in for a colder wedding during winter times (June to August) the benefit is that chances are that you will have some epic mountains photos & videos with snowy landscapes just like in movies such as Lord of the Rings. Although we talk about the cold, many couples have no issues with the cold, as long as they plan well.
We have talked about the cold, but there are some off-season days that are warmer days such as the end of April to May where we get beautiful autumn weddings, with the amazing colors of autumn.
That combined with the beautiful mountains is a recipe for a beautiful wedding.
Resolution
In short, there is a chance you can save up to 20% from your total wedding cost with an off-season wedding, there is a few challenges along the way but all of those challenges can be overcome with good homework.
Photo Above By @WilliamsPhotography
If you wish more advice, feel free to contact one of Eureka Films advisors or we can even point you towards some amazing wedding planners.
