The Secret of Staying Within a Budget

As I was sitting in a gala committee chair meeting, a friend, out of the blue decided to congratulate me in front of the entire group, as loudly as possible, on my 40th birthday. It was pretty embarrassing as I am a private person. The general conversation moved to the types of 40th birthday celebrations they had experienced. In quite a few cases, some unfortunate husbands forgot, and they have never lived it down.

Big birthday celebrations are generally thought of as high budget celebrations. If you have the budget – go for it, but if you don’t, your dreams don’t have to die. You probably have a long list of what you want to include in your event. Initial exuberance can pull you far from your initial goal. In order to come in on budget, you have to focus on the key items that are important to you.

Your first step is to decide on a comfortable budget up front, before you start spending, and then stick with it. If you stick your ground, put on your thinking cap, you will come up with something creative that will keep you within your spending plan. One thing you should ensure is that you have a buffer to your budget of at least 15 – 20%.

For example, if your budget is $1,000 (for ease of calculation), and your most important items are food and entertainment. You might budget $500.00 for food, and $200.00 for entertainment, however, by building in the 20% buffer, for all intents and purposes, the figure that you are working towards for food is $400.00 [$500.00 – $100 (20%)], and for entertainment, it is $160 [$200-$40 (20%)]. Almost always, there will be items that are forgotten and the 20% buffer takes care of that, allowing you to stay within budget.

You have to know exactly what you want to do. Decide on what your top three items are and get those priced first and place the bulk of your budget there. Whatever your fantasies are, fulfill those, then scale back on the other items.

All celebrations have a number of categories in common: a site, guests/invitations, music, food and beverage, décor and entertainment. To squeeze a fabulous party out of a tiny budget, go big on what is most important. If you want all your friends for the last 20 years to be there, then you maybe looking at a cocktail party, or a “pot-luck” affair, for low food costs. If you want 15 - 20 close friends, you can consider a sit-down dinner party, or a buffet dinner-party with some signature drinks, instead of a full-open bar.

Technology can easily take care of your music needs, turn-up your IPOD and no-one knows it isn’t the sound of a live DJ. Wholesale clubs can also help you pare down your food budget, with prepared or semi-prepared appetizers, entrees and desserts.

Today’s etiquette freedom says few rules apply, whatever you want to create you can.

Tell me in comments how you have been able to cut costs and stay within budget with your entertaining.