Asking guests to pay £50 for a birthday lunch?

I’d be happy if a friend said I’m thinking of doing lunch for my birthday, it’s here, here’s the menu and it’ll be £50 a head. It’s up front and clear, I can decide. If I was going to end up paying for me and DH, that’s ok, if we were bringing kids it would get expensive!

or….hire somewhere and provide nibbles/food and say BYO,

or put on nibbles and put money behind the bar….

Right. I think what the OP wants is an expensive hotel lunch, which is different.

Could you host lunch at yours but have caterers ? This would work out way cheaper than going to a restaurant and you wouldn’t have to cook or clean.
Or could you do the above but have the event at a friend’s house ( someone with more space )?

I wouldn’t go to this unless it was for a close relative.

She's hosting an event at a hotel, though. I think it's different to a group of mates going out for a curry or whatever.

My friends and I don't do parties, that's why I said everyone pays for their own meals and drinks themselves whenever we meet up on special occasions, this means no one has to feel obliged to host anything and pay for everyone when their own birthday rolls around.
We all tend to pick places with a similar price range, middle of the road, so everyone is happy to turn up if they want to. If for some reason someone picked a really expensive place they wanted to go to for their birthday, if people couldn't afford it then the birthday girl would be happy to go somewhere else, it's no big deal.

What matters is spending time with friends and enjoying yourselves, not trying to find the most exciting or social media pleasing setting so that people can spend all night making daft photos to show 'how much they're having fun'

50x40 so £2000 from guests? I think if you can’t afford to pay for your party you should change your plans

My friends usually (not big birthdays!) book a table at a restaurant for 15ish people for dinner, we split the bill. I am not going to the next one because it’ll be at least £50+. That’s quite normal too though surely?

The only time public transport doesn't run usually is Christmas and new year. That's an expensive time of year for most families so I wouldn't charge for a lunch. Why not get your DH to take you away for the weekend as a treat and then do the party in the summer?

I’m going to bet it’s an early January birthday. OP plan a few nice things to do around the dates so have a few nice things to look forward to.

😂

Inviting people to a private lunch in a separate room means you are asking them to pay for a limited menu/what is served thats just unreasonable. I think you need to scale down and host what the number you can afford from the full menu or say its on me but only from the set menu.

I’d never pay £50 for a meal. I don’t have that kind of money.

Cant you just arrange a small dinner for a few very close friends and maybe have a little pub meet up for the rest?

Gosh you sound so dramatic and defeatist.
If you had all these specific conditions for your birthday, then you should have started saving earlier.
Normally big birthdays are planned well in advance especially if you are going to be that fussy about it. Nothing seems to live up to your expectations but you haven’t done your own part in creating what you want. People have made lots of good suggestions and you are rejecting them all because of the vision in your head. If only that vision was going to make you happy you should have started saving ages ago.

For the love of god OP please tell us what date this awful day is??

So you want to host your birthday party but make your guests pay for attending. Absolutely not acceptable, if you can’t pay the associated costs of a party then don’t have one.

Maybe you could change the format, hire a local hall and everybody takes a dish along, somebody is in charge of the music, drinks etc etc

This 100%. Pick somewhere that you can afford to pay for with buffet food so people can come and go and mingle. See if you can budget for bottles of red and white wine and anything else they can order and pay for at the bar.

I'd only pay of it was my immediate family - mother/daughter/brother. I wouldn't pay to go to anyone else's birthday. Find a cheaper venue if you can't afford the hotel.

This sounds big but far from cosy. So couples would be paying £100? I couldn't afford that and would be extremely unhappy paying it for somewhere I hadn't chosen. My birthday falls just before Christmas and has always been celebrated very satisfactorily at home (massive M&S canapé order plus loads of drink), with twenty-odd people stuffed into my house.

I just think it's not a party if you have to pay for it. It puts a different complexion on it.

50 quid a head for lunch? I’d give that a swerve.

My dad’s birthday is during winter, and this year was a big birthday. He had an “unbirthday” in his garden during the summer. Food, birthday cake, lots of drink… we all sang happy birthday to him and he got presents. He didn’t charge anyone an entry fee or anything either. Was a great idea.

£50 a head seems a bit steep. Nice hotels around our way are a set meal for about £35 pp and people buy their own drinks. Would that work? Like you say not everyone will be able to attend.

She says she doesn't want the village hall. Too depressing.

I've been to one in a village hall where everyone brought a dish. They had garden games for the kids sbd a DJ later on.That was quite fun, I remember it fondly, and about as far as I'd accept for an invitation that expected something of me..

There's no way I'd ever pay £50 for a meal, especially on someone else's terms.

Plain cheeky!