Pre-wedding email. Bit weird?

[bookworm8500]

Invited to a colleague's wedding evening do and had an email come through to all guests (unless it has just come to me 🤣). Maybe I've just hit the nail on the head 🤣

It states, amongst loads of other instructions, that,

'A small buffet will be provided. This is for all guests to enjoy, so please be considerate with your portion sizes'.

I've never seen anything like that before! AIBU to find that very weird to be on a pre-wedding email?!

Sounds like good planning.

I mean it's fine it's actually quite funny nothing like being direct and getting to the point. I'd be to embarrassed for my own wedding but good for them for having the balls 🤣🤣

just light nibbles would have been more polite than telling to be mindfully portion sizes

I agree then if I got there and there’s more food than expected I’d think this is a really nice and generous spread.

We booked and paid for 75 guests for our wedding evening, but only 60 or so people came. We had food left over, but not 15 people’s worth. I think my hollow legged nephew took a doggie bag for the train, and a couple of people took a pasty. If we’d had 75 people attending the food table would’ve been stripped bare. I thought the quantities were generous too.

Bit weird and stingy, but I'd laugh.

Before feeling really paranoid that I was the buffet hogger.

I've ended up going hungry in the evening as an all-day guest. There was a hog roast van, and it had been a long while since lunch. The queue was epic and I didn't rush to join it as being 4m postnatal (and probably feeding 4m of ravenous baby by that time of evening) my SPD ridden pelvis was giving up for the day. By the time the queue calmed and I hobbled over, there were only scraps left. None of the plate loading men were the sole source of nutrition for another human!

It's hard to get portions right. Most normal range appetites should balance themselves right, but if you have a cluster of sharp-elbowed gluttons, it can throw the estimates off and leave more patient people going without. Some catering companies are mire realistic about their estimates than others

Amongst work guests, it's likely that there'll be someone with a buffet-hoovering reputation.

Ideally there should be plenty to go round, but I'd rather be forewarned that it's not likely to be a feast than expecting a reasonable sized meal for the evening and getting a crushing disappointment.

I think that's fair. I went to a wedding once where tables went to the buffet in turns. I was on the last table to go and there was nothing left. I left early and got a takeaway on the way home.

It’s a bit… cheap. I think their day guests will probably be starving 😆

At my brothers wedding the had a beautiful meal and so much food in the evening but some people took the absolute piss and had 3-4 plates loaded up their arm for themselves. By the time some people went up a lot of the popular choices were almost cleaned out. There should have been ample food but there was some greedy bastards there - no idea who they even were.

See I think it is the height of rudeness to request people show up, to make your event a celebration (as after all without them it isn't really much of one)...

Potentially have them travelling, it's costing them in various ways both financially and time wise.. and then NOT feed them properly.

Yup, really rude.

Yeah I do agree. Be clear on the invite.
I wonder though if in this case it is just because of people being greedy. Was having a conversation at work just last week about wedding buffets and how the people that go up last are left with nothing.

They're just on a budget, light buffet would have been better

I've never seen it said, but can see why it might be necessary.

Personally I eat before I go to a reception or party, I never assume there will be food or if there is that I might like the food that's there and don't get me started on children with grabby fingers or the person who never washes their hands....

So rude and bad form. People go to great effort and expense to attend weddings. At least cater for all of them. Nobody should go hungry. It doesn’t matter if some people have larger appetites!

I wouldn’t go! Sets the tone for the rest of the wedding for sure.

If you can’t afford to feed everyone then invite fewer guests and do it properly.

We went to a wedding where the buffet was breathtakingly stingy. Luckily we were with a friend who was a cateter and saw it being put out and said best be first up
I would have thought maybe it was the caterers but the couple were known to be tight as!

I work in catering, and we serve the buffet food. The number of guests is catered for, but it's to stop people taking more than one persons portion of food. It works well. Whatever is left after everyone has been served is left for second helpings. (Which you can then help yourself)
One function it was requested that the food was not served by staff. The number of people filling plates, taking two plates, complaining they didn't get certain foods, etc. was unreal, and then there was so much wastage because eyes were bigger than bellies.

Or invite less guests and feed them properly.

Everyone remembers the weddings where they go hungry…

It’s a bit weird yes, but I totally get it 🤣
At my own wedding, I’d didn’t get any of the buffet. Didn’t even realise it had been put out, the greedy bastard guests wolfed it all down about 2 hours before I even knew it had already been served 🤣 thankfully I was still full enough from lunch, but still! They could have saved me a few bites seeing as it was my bloody buffet 🤣

YANBU.
Eat in advance and don't spend too much on a wedding present.

Perhaps there are members of their family who storm buffets and leave a cherry tomato for everyone else to feast on?

Take sandwiches and chocolate biscuits and sell them at a huge profit to hungry guests.

Reminds me of the evening do for a work colleague. Only food provided was potted beef sandwiches. Not great for vegetarians. We ate crisps from the bar, drove back home earlier than intending, got a pizza and all went back to mine all dressed up.

I used to work at wedding venues it's standard practice to set food aside for the couple + wedding party.
Also how can you not have been informed it was served?

If that had been my wedding I'd be leaving bad reviews everywhere unless they were exceptionally cheap (granted, I don't know how long ago your wedding was)...

I think with people being used to all include this buffers and pulling plates high, buffets have become very costly and wasteful

there has been a bit of a cultural change I think, so whilst the message is cringe it is a shame they feel the need this put it on there

My DM went to an evening wedding reception where the instructions sent beforehand said that there would be a plate sharing system so one plate of food between two people. She wasn't impressed!

My guess would be that they have been to an evening do where the food ran out! Some people are ridiculous at buffets. I don't so much mind if they eat it but people who load their plate and then don't eat most of it drive me mad (unless there's a really good reason obviously - yes, I would rather you stopped than be sick on me).

I remember when I used to work in my previous team, we were told to not take too much from a buffet that had been put on by our unit manager. They ignored her and most of the best bits were taken by the time I came up to it.