Want to know how much is a Sailcloth Marquee for a wedding in the UK? Full Breakdown with 10 Steps to Keep Your Wedding Costs Controllable
Planning a Sailcloth marquee wedding is an exciting journey—but perhaps the biggest question on couples’ minds is: how much is this going to cost? The honest answer is: it depends. Every wedding is unique, and the final price will vary depending on your choices, location, and style. Here’s your full breakdown and 10 ways to help you budget with confidence and without surprises.
What Affects the Cost of a Sailcloth Marquee Wedding
1. Size and Guest Numbers
The starting point for any quote is the Sailcloth marquee’s size—typically measured by width and length. Larger marquees, naturally, cost more. A setup for 80 guests in a 12m x 18m Sailcloth might differ significantly in price from one sized to fit 200 guests seated. The level of detail we go into allows you to visualise the best fit for your wedding, just like we do in our article about choosing the right marquee size for your wedding.
2. Flooring Options
Hard flooring can vary from coir matting in terms of price. Coir matting is more budget-friendly, while a hard flooring & carpet option adds comfort and practicality but also cost (it’s not cheap and tends to add at least £1000 to your price). 80% of our Sailcloth weddings are perfectly happy with coir matting as typical Sailcloth weddings happen in the summer where the ground is naturally firm.
Coir matting doesn’t do too well if the terrain is quite bumpy. Sometimes it’s cheaper to pay a landscaper to do some prep work to the proposed Sailcloth area, who can level out bumps with topsoil and grass seed (so this will need some advanced planning to do) and then you have a permanent levelled lawn for a cheaper cost than the boarded flooring.
This example shows a Sailcloth Marquee fitted with Coir Matting
This example shows a Sailcloth Marquee fitted with Boarded Flooring & Carpet
4. Your Choice of Catering
Formal Catering
One of the largest contributors to your overall Sailcloth Marquee Hire costs is the choice of catering you will have for your guests. If you are wanting a more formal/traditional style of catering such a as a 2/3 course meal, this will increase your overall wedding costs quite a lot. Formal catering costs can now be north of £100 per head, so that’s £12000 for an average 120 person wedding alone. On top of this, you will likely require a catering tent (£300-£500) built by your Sailcloth Marquee Hire Company and likely a generator to power everything inside the catering tent. This style of catering requires 2/3 hot ovens, fryers etc and if there is no mains 3 phase electrics nearby, you will need a Generator (expect to pay around £900-£1000 after generator delivery, fuel and cable distribution to all suppliers)
Informal Catering
If you are thinking of something more informal such as a BBQ, hog roast, or food trucks then your overall catering costs will be significantly cheaper. Expect to pay around £30-£45 per head for this style of catering. So your catering costs are only around £4000-£5000 compared to £13000 after the add ons for formal catering – it makes a huge difference!
You can still have informal catering served to tables with serving staff, so guests aren’t queueing outside in the rain. I’m planning this style of catering for my own wedding, as my partner and I aren’t focussed so much on the food for our day and have halved our catering costs this way. Our food trucks are prepping the food off site, delivering it with serving staff to tables – so we still have the formality of traditional catering, but with half the cost. This is something that is definitely trending for 2025/26 weddings and is starting to become the norm.
Informal caterers do not require a catering tent nor their power requirements do not require a generator, their equipment can run off mains domestic power absolutely fine in most circumstances.
Tip to Reduce Catering Costs: Consider inviting less day guests and invite more evening guests to reduce the guest numbers who need to be fed!
4. Furnishings and Styling
Tables, chairs, linings, bars, décor—these are major influence points on cost. Choosing simple rustic styling and wooden furniture could stay within budget.
We offer 3 different types of chair, starting off with Folding Wooden Chairs at £3.90 (after VAT) per chair. Limewash Chiavari Chairs that come with a seat pad start from £5 per chair and Rustic Crossback Chairs £5.40 per chair. So if you had 100 guests to be seated, your chair price can vary by around £100-£150.
If you opt for a small style of Bar, for example a 5-10ft Straight Bar or Half Round Bar this will keep your Bar hire costs down. If you would like a Fully Round Bar which acts as a fantastic focal point, it sometimes does force you to go up a Sailcloth Marquee size to fit this in. Going up a Sailcloth size does tend to increase your costs by a further £1200 plus the cost of the larger Round Bar
5. Location, Location, Location…
If you are lucky enough to have space at home, or your parent’s home for a Sailcloth then you’re in luck, as you likely won’t need to be paying any land/venue hire costs! However if you really would love to have your special day inside a Sailcloth Marquee, you will of course need to source land or book a venue to do so. If you know a farmer with a field then this is your most cost effective option.
Dry Hire Wedding venues will eat into your wedding budget and wedding venues typically cost between £1500-£5000+ depending if you’re booking a basic open space set up, or a stately home.
If cost is important and you would like just an open space, check out these websites to see if there is somethign suitable in your location:
6. Time of Year
Summer weddings may only need minimal heating, but outer seasons bring higher heating costs, especially if you go with heaters or open fires. Choosing off-peak dates (like May or September) can offer both availability and cost benefits.
Marquee Hire companies are a seasonal business, being busy between the months of May-September, so they quite literally have to “make hay whilst the sun shines”- there are some key dates that are more expensive than others, quite simply due to demand outstrips supply. If your date is flexible and you’re keen on keeping costs to a minimum avoid:
- The last two weekends of June and the first weekend of July
- The first two weeks of September
- Any bank holiday weekends
7. Location and Access
Venues that are remote or difficult to access raise logistics costs. Travel time, crew labour, and effort of installation can add a few hundreds of pounds to your quote. If a Sailcloth Marquee Hire Company can drive trailers/vans right up to where they are installing it, this saves lots of “man-hours” in labour and will be far cheaper compared to having to carry 4tonnes of equipment with a 30m walk.
8. Non Optional Add-ons
There may be some additional options you quite simply have to have otherwise your wedding won’t function. For example if your Sailcloth Marquee is going to be in a field, or a venue with no power or toilet facilities then you will need to have these brought in.
Generators: Expect to pay around £900-£1100 for a Generator after adding in the deisel and cabling. Most generator prices do not include your diesel and you might get an unexpected £300 bill after your event. We are one of the very few Marquee Hire Companies who own our own generators, and we include your expected deisel usage included in your price. Again, most other Companies do not do this, but we get in touch with all of your suppliers involved with your sailcloth wedding and provide power sockets for all – which is another thing you don’t need to worry about.
Toilets: With sites/locations without toilet facilities expect to pay around £800-£1100 for a luxury toilet trailer depending on the amount of guests you have coming. These self contained toilet blocks are fitted with lighting, heating, mirrors, hot & cold water as well as paper towells & loo rolls. They don’t require any connecting to water/sewage and just need a plugging into for some power.
9. Non Optional Add-ons
Dance floors, exterior festoon lighting, stages and chillout areas all add up in terms of pricing. If you are having coir matting flooring inside your Sailcloth Marquee you will likely need a dance floor inside. Dancing on coir matting isn’t as practical. If you do opt for the more expensive boarded flooring & carpet which offers a firmer footing, you could dance in an open space without the need for a dance floor to save on costs.
10. How you Run Your Bar
Some would say the bar is the most important part of any wedding! There are three ways you can run a bar for your Sailcloth Wedding:
- Book a Mobile Bar Hire Company: This is by far the easiest in terms of amount of work for you to do. They will bring all bars, fridges, staff & glass hire however whoever is paying for it, will be paying “pub prices” for everynoe’s drinks. You are essentially taking all 100+ to a put and footing the bill afterwards. It gets expensive!
- Dry Hire Bar Service: Your Sailcloth Marquee Company should at the very least be able to provide you a bar to go inside. At Abacus we can provide the full bar infrastructure including fridges, glass hire & bar staff. You buy the alcohol “wholesale” at much cheaper prices compared to a mobile bar hire company. Even with the additional bar, fridge & staffing costs, your overall drinks costs will be half compared to bringing in a mobile bar company. Shops such as Costco, Tesco etc even deliver, so it makes it even easier!
- Pay Bar Service: This is the same as option two, however we can bring in cash tills for a pay bar service. You can decide whether guests pay for their drinks all day, or perhaps you cover a certain amount, and fro example from 7pm all guests now pay for their drinks.
If done correctly, a pay bar can provide a small profit to contribute towards your wedding budget – you can view this article here.
This article explains that your marquee Company could provide the infrastructure for a pay bar (bars, fridges, bar staff, tills etc). You provide the alcohol and you will be able to make a small profit (£1000-£2000) to contribute to your overall costs of your wedding.
And at the same time guests will be paying considerably cheaper prices. We amongst other marquee hire companies can provide all the infrastructure required to do this without the help of an external bar high company who’d usually make the profit.
Typical Price Examples
To give you a clearer picture, here are three real-world scenarios (indicative figures):
- Small wedding (80 guests) – £5,000–£8,000. Includes mid-spec flooring, basic lighting, standard furnishings.
- Medium wedding (150 guests) – £10,000–£14,000. Upgraded flooring, upgraded furnishings, standard lighting.
- Large wedding (200+ guests) – £15,000+. Upgraded flooring, premium lighting, advanced flooring etc.
These examples aim to guide you. Your bespoke quote may alter significantly depending on venue terrain, season, and styling choices.
What’s Usually Included (and What’s Not)
Included in most quotes:
- Sailcloth structure
- Flooring
- Basic lighting (festoon or fairy lighting)
- Standard tables and chairs
Usually not included:
- Catering, bar stock, flowers, stationery
- Generator hire and fuel (unless explicitly stated)
- Toilets or luxury loo-hire (unless explicitly stated)
- Damage waiver or site insurance (we include our Damage Waiver in all of our quotes, so there not an unplanned £300-£500 bill when it comes to paying your balance – do check the small print in other quotations!)
We believe transparency matters—you should know what’s included, and what could be added separately.
Hidden Costs Couples Often Forget
- Generator and fuel hire
- Toilets and restroom facilities
- Temporary kitchens or catering tents
- Mileage for long-distance delivery
Making these clear early on prevents unwelcome surprises so do double check with your Companies you’ve obtained your quote from, you want all of your up front costs stated.
Ways to Manage or Reduce Costs
- Opt for coir matting rather than raised flooring where safe to do so
- Keep guest numbers realistic to avoid upsizing unnecessarily (reduce day guests to reduce catering costs)
- Reduce the amount of day guests to reduce catering costs
- Choose off-peak weekend dates (avoiding end of June, start of July, start of September & Bank Holiday weekends)
- Let us help match you with trusted suppliers to bundle or negotiate services
How Much is a Sailcloth Marquee?
Conclusion and Next Steps
A Sailcloth marquee wedding lets you design the celebration of your dreams—but costs vary widely based on your choices. Start with this guide, then let us tailor a quote just for you. We’re here to help you create the perfect day—beautiful, unique, and built around your priorities.
Next step: Request your personalised quote and we’ll break down exactly what’s included, with no obligation. Thank you for trusting us to help you plan your perfect day 😃
