To ask guests to contribute to my wedding?

[DontForgetTheLightAlesLawrence]

Please give your honest thoughts on what you would think to receiving this in a wedding invitation.

Along with saying yes or no to coming, and whether you have any special dietary requirements, it has a bit saying that all drinks on the day/evening will be free, with a small contribution request, on the return of the invitation. Childrend drinks are free so no contribution required: non alcohol drinking adults £5, alcohol drinking adults £10.

No. I sort of understand your reasoning but it's not acceptable - or indeed workable - to do this. What if I say I'm going to drink but then can't because I'm on antibiotics or something. Will you refund me my fiver? Or if I say I won't drink but then fancy half a shandy. What then?

Put some money behind the bar so everyone can have a couple of free drinks. £6.50 is steep for a G&T but not totally ludicrous where I live. I expect hotel bars to be expensive anyway. Can you negotiate better prices with your venue?

My immediate thoughts:

Don't make the drinks free if you can't afford to cover it.

Better, save more and cover the drinks

Invite the number you can afford to host

Postpone the wedding until you can afford to get married

It's not compulsory to get married

Just have a pay bar, it's perfectly normal.

You cannot charge people to go to your wedding. If you can't afford your wedding then you need to downsize it and have what you can afford. It's not up to your guests to pay for it for you. Don't take the piss.

Everybody is always prepared to buy their own drinks and are usually expectant of the extortionate prices.

I think just sticking to a usual pay more saves way more hassle than making everybody pay etc, it will be hard to police and there will be some people that completely take the piss and order crazy amounts of drinks that then go to waste.

Although most logical people will realise £10 AI drinks is a bargain, it will still be taken as a strange request. People don't always think with logic!!

No, no. Just not the done thing. It's like charging for attendance. I think if you can't afford to have an open bar then you just put a certain amount of cash behind the bar and be done with it and charge when all the money is spent, or you just have a 'pay at the bar' system but have free drinks (wine, bubbly, soft drinks etc) available at the tables for free.

Really odd and how do you intend to police it? What's wrong with a few free glasses with the dinner and having a paid bar anyway? Unless you have some dodgy deal on copious amounts of alcohol!

Where weddings I've been to have had a free bar, there's usually been a box for donations on the bar. This has usually been in circumstances like blu describes where the bride and groom have bought in the booze rather than at a venue bar. Both times DH and I put in twenty quid each which was about half of what we would have spent buying from a bar.

I totally see where you're coming from, but demanding money from guests leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

Yabu

I feel embarrassed on your behalf.

Pay bar if you can't afford all drinks in.

You can't send an entrance fee to your wedding

Tacky and awful, a horrible idea.

A host is supposed to provide everything, if you can't scale back the guest list or save for longer.

I wouldn't like that on an invitation if I'm honest. Some people would clearly drink more than others and that would rile me.
Much better to just have a pay bar and everyone can drink what they want then.
Maybe put a bottle of white and red wine on each table if you can afford it but I'd let everyone just pay

You either do a fee bar or you do a paying bar. You do not charge your guests a drinking fee.

I would not recommend asking people to pay for drinks at a wedding.

If money is tight, just buy bottles of wine etc from a supermarket and serve those.

Have a bar where people buy there own drinks too. Weddings don't have to cost the earth.

It's an awful idea, sorry! I'm all for byo or a cash bar but essentially ticketing your wedding is a bad idea. What if people say no, how would you know who has / hasn't paid - are you going to issue wrist bands?!

Just have a cash bar.

A horrible, embarrassing idea. If you can't afford a big wedding, have a small wedding.

No, just no. Please have a bit of dignity and grace, it is your wedding for goodness sakes.

I had thought this was a reverse when I read the OP.

Please just have a pay bar. The idea of effectively an entrance fee for the wedding is cringeworthy and unclassy.

If you do go down this route, then I assume you won't also be hoping for wedding gifts too?

Nah, wouldn't bother me, a pint and a G&T would put you straight over the tenner.
Last wedding we went to was at a posh hotel in the New Forest, Jesus Christ, if I hadn't taken a water bottle with Gin in it in my bag we'd have needed to take out a pay day loan.

Your guest aren't there to fund your wedding.

That is really bad. I would be offended if I received that request in an invitation. At my wedding we had drinks on arrival and free wine all day and evening. Anything else was from a paying bar.

How would you collect it? Ask people to send cash with their RSVP and chase up ones who haven't paid up?

Unless this is a pot luck /picnic/ buffet do-it-yourself wedding where guests are pitching in with all sorts of help, then no. It's just tacky at a sit down meal.

Could your budget stretch to providing non alcoholic drinks for entire event and wine during meal? All else a paid bar.

And yes, I'd rather pay 6.50 for a single gin and tonic I choose to order than be asked for 10 in an invitation! Plus - do you really want people getting stupid drunk? Because asking for a tenner encourages that sort of "getting your money's worth" mentality.

No. Seriously just no.

Terrible idea. Cringe!

How are you going to fund it though - a tenner from everyone is still only 1.5 Gina NS roni s each?!

I would decide that they didn't want me there as a guest enough to cover the costs and would probably turn down the invitation. I wouldn't be bothered if it was a paying bar though.

Just a ponder - everyone who says "scale back your wedding guest list to one you can afford" - do you all have really small families who won't be offended to be left out or something? Do you have any idea of the guilt levels that can be inflicted if you miss out half the family because of cost?

I wouldn't like an invite like this. Cut your wedding cloth to fit. Weddings don't have to be expensive. If you can't afford it change some of you arrangements in my opinion. We paid for the first few drinks and wine for the table then it was a cash bar. I expect to pay for drinks at the reception but don't like the idea of paying an entrance fee to attend.

But then I also don't like the "Money towards our honeymoon" thing either!