Some people have a chocolate (or even cheese - See www.houseofcheese.co.uk) wedding cake which can be eaten in place of dessert, and  save you money. This is ok if you are doing your own catering but the problem  with catered weddings is that most caterers make their profits from the puddings, so they won't knock much off the package price if you want to miss off the pudding.

A big pile of iced fairy cakes is popular substitute and they are easy to make but they need to be freshly baked, so you would have to find a friend prepared to spend the day before the wedding making them.  An alternative would be cupcakes.  You can often buy these in supermarkets, the ones that come in little Mr. Kipling-style boxes of six or eight often have about a month on the sell by date, and could be decorated with  little flowers or the bride and groom's initials.

Ready made sugar  roses are very expensive if you need lots of them but very easy to make.  Buy a pack of ready to roll fondant icing, this comes in all different colours these days.  Take a piece between 1 and 2 cm long and roll it into a long narrow cone shape.  Then take another piece and flatten it into a thin circle approx the size of a 2p piece and wrap it around the cone, like a petal, gently curling the upper edge out. Carry on adding petals until the rose is the required size, then twist the rose off the base of the cone and nip it together.  Any that don't work can be squashed up,  and remade! You can even practice with blu-tack! Try looking for 'fondant roses' on You Tube, there is a clip of someone showing you how it is done.

Some specialist cake shops are now employing an old war time trick of making dummy cakes, which can be hired.  The Bride and Groom have their photo taken "cutting" the cake , which is then whisked off into the kitchen and no-one notices that the slices of cake which emerge later are cut from a simple slab. This means you can have a wonderful looking cake for a fraction of the cost.