Margaret Williams' children had it made when they decided to get married. Williams is a Columbia event planner whose business consists mostly of weddings. She had the local contacts, knew the caterers, the great spots for a ceremony. But both her children opted instead for destination weddings.
Her son got married at a resort in Florida. Her daughter chose Charlottesville, Va., home of the University of Virginia, where she and her fiance went to school.
"For the family, personally, it was much more fun," Williams said. "Because we felt like we were on vacation, too."
An increasing number of brides are spurning traditional weddings and are heading out of town, where they can get married and have a honeymoon at the same time.
Couples are choosing resorts in exotic locations, and also regional destinations that are just a drive away.
Hawaii and Jamaica are the most popular spots for destination weddings, according to Bride's Magazine. But there are plenty of regional options as well.
Maryland's Eastern Shore, the Outer Banks in North Carolina, Nemacolin Woodlands Resort & Spa in southwestern Pennsylvania, Hotel Hershey in Hershey, Pa., are just a few places in the area that offer wedding packages.
According to Yolanda Crous, senior travel editor at Bride's, 8 percent of the 24 million weddings in the United States annually are destination weddings.
One-stop shopping
One of the biggest attractions for such weddings is cost, Crous said. The average price tag for a traditional wedding is $22,000. A destination wedding can be a lot cheaper.
"Automatically, your guest list shrinks because you don't have to invite your dad's business partner's cousins," Crous explained. "You're only going to be inviting your closest friends and family.
"And often, if you're getting married at a hotel, you're probably going to have a wedding coordinator do a lot of the work for you," she added. "Generally, young women are working these days, and they don't have time to plan every single detail of some huge, extraordinary event."
In addition, she said, many destination weddings are second marriages. "A lot of those people have already done the big old extravaganza wedding thing before, so they're looking for something a little more low-key, a little less stressful."
Weddings at regional resorts have been on the rise since the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, according to an informal survey of wedding planners. Some couples are still uncomfortable about flying and are looking closer to home for a combination wedding and honeymoon.
