Honeymoon Funds: How To Set One Up + Buy Our Honeymoon

Weekends are for wedmin – a chance to catch up on that all important wedding admin and that might well include making plans for a honeymoon.

The honeymoon is something we’re going to be exploring in more detail in the coming weeks with some of our favourite honeymoon planning experts, including the excellent Buy Our Honeymoon, who we’re chatting with today.

A quick low-down for you; Buy Our Honeymoon was founded up by real-life couple, Shelley and Andrew Green, who tied the knot 15 years ago and have since become true experts in the field of honeymoon planning.

When planning their own wedding, Shelley and Andrew were taken aback by the kindness of their friends, whose generosity helped to kick start their marriage with the most unforgettable and memorable honeymoon (a 3,000 mile road trip around the USA – nice!) that otherwise, the couple couldn’t have possibly afforded.

This ‘honeymoon fund’ created through friends and family gifting donations meant that Shelly and Andrew could thank those who had contributed, for the lifetime experiences and memories they’d provided, rather than thanking them simply for the money.

And it was this experience that would go on to inspire the genius business opportunity that is now Buy Our Honeymoon.

With the experience they have gathered in helping so many couples set up their own honeymoon fund now, Shelley and Andrew know that this is a key time of year for planning honeymoons and were keen to share some of their wisdom and knowledge with you. I hope you find the below super helpful.  For more information, check out buy-our-honeymoon.com or call 0345 224 0189.

What’s a honeymoon fund and how does it work?

It’s a wedding registry for your honeymoon instead of gifts for your home.

You might already have made a home together, and you might already have all the kitchen equipment, linens and cushions you really need. So a traditional wedding gift list might be less useful and meaningful to you than being able to afford the dream honeymoon you’ve always wanted.

With a honeymoon fund, it’s all about the experience; you can swap cutlery for meals, pillows for hotels, art prints for air fare. Your guests visit your registry on the web, choose their gift, and make a payment to help make your honeymoon happen.

Some honeymoon funds are directly attached to travel agents, and your gifts are used towards paying off your booking. Others, like Buy Our Honeymoon, are independent services where you receive the cash value of your gifts to spend as appropriate.

Can’t I just include a money poem in our invitations?

Of course — and lots of couples decide to do just that. But it’s worth considering your options.

A honeymoon fund bridges the gap between simply asking for cash, and having a more formal wedding registry. It means your guests are able to think about what their gift represents, separately from the amount they’re spending.

Most guests want to be able to give you a gift they can name, something more than just a number on some paper in a card. A honeymoon fund means that you get the valuable help towards your honeymoon expenses, while your guests get to choose a gift that can mean something to them.

What’s the etiquette?

There’s only really one golden rule of etiquette: thank your guests for their gifts.

Just like a traditional wedding gift list in the UK, you can decide whether you’d like to include a note about your registry in with your invitation. (Although in the US, this is generally frowned on.) If you have a wedding website, you can simply link to your honeymoon fund from there.

Unlike a traditional wedding gift list, though, your honeymoon fund isn’t just a collection of brands, quantities and costs.

You can be more creative in describing your plans, and really engage your guests with what you’re hoping for.

We’d recommend being clear that your fund is just a guide for people who’d like a steer on the gifts you’d most like, but that gifts aren’t expected, and anything people do give you is very much appreciated.

But you know your guests best, and you can let your personalities show. Be fun, be funny, be romantic, be irreverant, be sincere — be yourselves.

What will our guests think?

We’ve found that guests can often become quite protective of their gifts, and genuinely attached to the idea they’ve chosen. It’s so much easier to emotionally invest in a gift of gelato in Rome than a set of matching dessert spoons for your drawer.

A honeymoon fund can often be more appealing and engaging than a traditional registry, and certainly more so than just a gift of cold hard cash. Your guests want their gift to be meaningful to you, and want you to have something by which you can remember them, something that acknowledges their love for you.

Some guests will nonetheless prefer to get you something physical, and that’s okay. Some guests will always want to go off-list, and that’s okay too. Your honeymoon fund isn’t a demand.

With Buy Our Honeymoon, we keep our own branding to an absolute minimum and you can choose from a variety of web addresses. You can select and customise one of our gorgeous design themes, and you can put together an intro page to help guide your guests through the process. You can even accept gift suggestions!

Do we need to have booked everything beforehand?

With a fund linked to a travel agent, yes. But with an independent service like Buy Our Honeymoon, you don’t even need to yet know exactly where you’re headed.

Some couples use their fund to help them work out what they can afford, and then make a booking after their list has closed. Others use the process of compiling their registry as a way of planning their itinerary.

You’re not locked in to any travel provider, and your gift money is always sent to you directly, as soon as each payment clears. So you can use your funds whenever you’re ready, without needing to book anything right away.

You can keep your registry open for as long as you wish, even after your wedding, and you can make adjustments to your gift list at any time.

How much do we need to have planned?

Your gift list can include literally anything you can think of — you’re not choosing from a pre-determined catalogue of gifts. So you can be as specific or as general as you need, and you can make your list as simple or as detailed as you want.

With Buy Our Honeymoon, you can mix-and-match different styles of gift. You can have some one-off gifts (for example, a couples’ massage) where once it’s bought, it’s bought. You can have some gifts (for example, cocktails on the beach) that could be bought multiple times.

You can have group gifts and open contributions. It’s incredibly flexible, but easy to put together. And we’re here to help every step of the way.

Some couples like to offer a wide variety of items and tell the story of their honeymoon through their gifts. Others prefer to just have a single open contribution and to describe their plans instead. It’s completely up to you!

What happens if our plans change?

With an independent service, you’re not committed to anything. You can amend your list any time before it closes, and if you find you can’t do something you’d planned when you’re on your honeymoon, the funds are still yours to use on something else instead.

Your friends and family love you, and they don’t secretly believe you’re going to spend your wedding gifts on your rent. If you discover that you can’t go parasailing because of bad weather, the fact that you can spend your gift on something else romantic and fun is good news for everyone!

For more information, check out buy-our-honeymoon.com or call 0345 224 0189.