Florists and Caterers and Dress-makers, oh my! Yes, getting married means there are scores of vendors who want to make your day absolutely perfect…for a price that is. As future man and wife go through the process of choosing a wedding hall, a caterer, a church, a florist, a baker, etc. they discover that the man or woman who promises to give them exactly what they want are going to make sure that, at the very least, their bank accounts remember this day for a long, long time.

Not all vendors are bad, but all vendors must be kept in check. My wife and I began to discover this when every estimate that came in made her cry and made me yell. We had a florist who was going to make us pay for seemingly ever flower that was in the room while our arrangements were being made, bakers who wanted to charge us per grain of flour and don't even get me started on the DJ's. Our worst experience was with something called "plus, plus." Plus, plus meant that on top of every price the banquet hall gave us they would add tax and gratuity. We paid for chairs and chair covers, plus tax on both, plus gratuity on both. We paid $1.50 per slice of cake cut, plus tax on the cutting, plus gratuity. Plus, plus turned into minus, minus when it came to my wallet.

Every time I heard plus, plus, or "cake cutting fee" or "for just a little bit extra you can…" I started to lose it and wondered if Vegas wasn’t such a bad idea. When it came down to it though, my wife and I learned to keep our priorities straight. We sat down and decided that some parts of our wedding were more important than others. For example: every DJ we either talked to or looked into wanted to charge between $500 and $1,500 for performing at our wedding. Every wedding DJ I could remember was not only lame, but played Donna Summers ad nausea. So, my wife and I decided that if we came up with a play list, borrowed a friend's computer and rented a sound system ourselves, we could save at least $1,000. It may sound cheesy, but in the end all our wedding was missing was some 35-year-old with a moustache playing the Electric Slide.

I've had friends who went to the extreme to cut down on the vendor expense. At my best man's wedding, we sat up until 3:00 am the night before his wedding folding pieces of paper, taping flowers, and doing a thousand other things. What we all learned was that it wasn't worth paying a stranger thousands of dollars, sometimes tens of thousands, on the chance that the flowers, or the cake, or the limo, or whatever will be perfect. The idea of the perfect wedding is what drives people to vendors in the first place. It's not to say that any woman should lower her standards for the big day, but that both men and women should know that any florist, baker, caterer, limo company, dress maker, etc. is going to sell them as much as they can, and vendors have no shame about promising perfection.

Here are a few tips to remember when dealing with vendors:

1. Remember to prioritize.

What's more important to the both of you, flowers or cake? This could allow you to get a slightly less expensive cake in order to pay for more flowers.

2. Count your resources.

Is your cousin a photographer? Can your grandmother make the best strawberry shortcake in the world? Working in conjunction with the first tip, if you have someone you're on the fence about inviting, but who also is a florist, then you know what you can ask them for as a gift don't you?

3. Remember that wedding vendors aren't looking for repeat business.

While every florist shop has photos of people thanking them for the perfect arrangement, they probably have hundreds of "you people are evil" letters they've thrown away. Not that every vendor is out to get you, but weddings only happen once, maybe twice in a lifetime. So thinking that the "great price" you're being offered isn't just sales talk is naïve.

4. Don't forget to haggle, bargain and complain. No price is final.

I repeat, NO price is final. And, don't forget to use the age old "But I talked to the Main Street Bakery and they said they could do it for half that price." That's a very effective tool.