I planned my wedding on a spreadsheet with twenty-two tabs

We came in $612 under, and not because we were disciplined. We came in under because six weeks out I could see, in one cell, what the open bar was actually going to cost — and we switched to beer, wine and one cocktail. That was the whole trick: the number was visible early enough to do something about it.

That is what most wedding advice is missing. It will tell you the average wedding costs a number, then leave you to work out what that means for a Saturday in October with 87 guests and a $14,000 ceiling. The gap between a statistic and a decision is the entire subject of this site.

What I actually do

I’m an operations manager at a ninety-person company. My job is largely spreadsheets — forecasts, headcount, who is doing what by when. Planning a wedding turned out to be the same problem in a prettier dress, which is why the file worked, and why friends kept asking me to send it.

What I’m not

Not a wedding planner. Not a financial adviser. No certifications, no vendor relationships to protect — which is precisely why I can be blunt about contracts, deposits and the word all-inclusive, which at our venue excluded linens, the cake-cutting fee, and anything after 10pm.

What you’ll find here

Budgets, checklists, timelines, guest lists and vendor questions — with the arithmetic on the page. No real-weddings galleries, no styled shoots. If you would rather open a spreadsheet than a mood board, this was built for you.