More and more couples are choosing to elope these days. It may still be a small percentage of the total weddings that occur every year, but the market share is definitely growing.
In fact, eloping in 2019 is now the trendy thing to do for Millenials. And with many people marrying for a second time, a Destination Elopement is a great way to legally commit to your partner and have a lot of fun without settling for a sterile “courthouse wedding ceremony.”
So here today, I’m offering you ten reasons to seriously consider a Destination Elopement as an option over the traditional wedding. Don’t get me wrong. I do not knock the traditional wedding. That is still by far the most popular way to tie the knot. And though nowadays I shoot mostly elopements and small intimate weddings, I still do provide Photography for traditional weddings. Our Simple I Do’s officiants preside over traditional weddings as well as elopements. We are simply looking here at trends and the rationale for those trends.
- Rinse. Repeat. – If you are getting married for the second, third or ninetieth time, and you have already had that fairy-tale extravaganza once, then a small wedding or a destination elopement is great option for you. You haven’t given up on love, and you’ve met your soulmate this time, but you don’t need to coordinate fifteen bride’s maids, a three tiered cake and a banquet for three hundred guests! Yes, I think you should opt for an elopement package for the two of you and bring a couple of your close friends to accompany you.
- Convenience – We’re the fast-food and microwave generations, right? If you require a quick nuptial, nothing is quicker and easier to plan and get yourself hitched, than an adventurous elopement. In reality, you don’t have to have the adventure – but why not? (Just please don’t do a courthouse wedding, treat yourself with some dignity!) We’ve had couples call us on a Tuesday and get married on a Friday. Planning a traditional wedding can take up to a year or longer. Eloping has much less to coordinate, so infinitely more convenient.
(Our tagline is: Bring your Rings and License and we take care of the rest. Want champagne, a cake to share and music for a first dance? Simple I Do’s has packages for all of that! Talk about convenience!)
- Expedience – Some couples want to go ahead and elope now, then have their big wedding or at least a large party later. For those in the military, it has many benefits in particular especially regarding housing and whether or not your spouse can move with you when you are transfered. Note to some as we approach tax season, some do get married in order to file jointly, and some will elope before they renew their driver’s license just so they only have to do it once. And still some want that baby they made together to have their joint last name. Finally, others just want to be married quietly and wait to tell their family later.
- Experience – It seems like you get to a certain age, and you’re going to a wedding every other week. After a few of those summers, you may decide that a small adventurous, location wedding or intimate destination elopement is much more to be desired than a huge public soiree. People are getting married these days on the beach, on mountain tops, by waterfalls and in many more exotic places. The memories made here may actually stick with a couple longer than the highly stressed menageries where couples are barely able to remember whether they tasted the wedding cake or not!
- Control – For many modern couples, they have the large blow-out fairy-tale weddings because they are EXPECTED TO. Moms and Dads, friends and relatives, though well intended, can put huge burdens of expectation on young couples. And if your cultural history supports a big shindig, then by all means you should comply. But many modern couples are waiting longer to get married now, so they feel like they have long since cut the apron strings and want to get married on their own terms – and often with their own money, plans, etc. For them, intimate small elopement packages are the perfect recipe for maintaining independent control of their own life.
- The Quiet Factor – Some couples just don’t like the big shows and all of the high expectations of large weddings. Many second marriages are this way. They leave the kids with the grandparents and come to get away to the mountains for privacy, intimacy and the quiet romance of a small intimate elopement for just the two of them.
- The Cool Factor – Some couples just want to be different than everyone else. Call them non-conformists if you like. But walking down a mountain trail is more suitable to them than walking a church aisle. Taking their photos while the sun is setting on a distant mountain range is cooler than posing with thirty over-dressed cousins you barely even know in front of an altar. You get the idea. Why not make your marriage – your special day – an adventure?
- 2. and 1. Cost. Cost. Cost. – The average wedding in America today is more than most people put down to buy a house. According to the experts at costofwedding.com:
The average wedding cost in the United States for 2017 was $25,764. Couples, on average, spend between $19,323 and $32,205 but, 50% of couples spend less than$15,000. This does not include cost for a honeymoon.
Even when the economy is booming, that is a lot of cash. Once again, if you have the means, then you should definitely go for it. But more and more couples see that extravagance as a colossal waste and are downsizing their expectations while choosing destination elopements over traditional weddings. With credit card debt, burdensome college loans, and the rising cost of housing these days, more and more couples are indeed making the switch.
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