Destination weddings are gaining favour with British couples, with increasing numbers opting to hold their wedding ceremonies abroad.
With the cost of weddings increasing in UK, exotic locations are appearing to offer better value, and the lure of sunshine and white sand is proving difficult to ignore for the romantically inclined.
Recently, a report by the Daily Mail newspaper pegged the average cost of weddings in the UK at around £18,500 for a couple, while destination weddings can work out to a much cheaper price. Some of the favourite wedding destinations for couples are Italy and Las Vegas and Hawaii in the US, while Barbados, St Lucia and Antigua in the Caribbean are also catching up fast, according to figures from Holiday Hypermarket, a UK based holiday comparison site.
The 2012 Destination Weddings Study has reported that the market for destination weddings is currently around 350,000 annually, with around half of them having a duration of for four or more days.
Around 51 percent of destination wedding couples appoint a wedding planner, and 69 percent of these weddings are held outdoors to add to the glamorous ambience. The study revealed that 86 percent of couples that opt for a destination wedding prefer to continue with their honeymoon at the wedding venue.
Calum Macdonald, the e-commerce manager at Holiday Hypermarket, said, ‘There are so many destinations that have idyllic settings, but which are also affordable locations to plan a wedding. Barbados and Antigua are just two beauty spots that are worth investigating this year.’
