To think rehearsal dinners should be paid for?

[Sundaycoffee]

I'm a bridesmaid at my friends wedding in November. She is a bride on a budget. I've had to pay for my own dress, shoes, makeup etc which is fine and I'm happy to do. The wedding is a 2 hour drive away so I'm also paying for a hotel for 2 nights and quite frankly I can't afford anything more. Alongside the hen, do the wedding will cost me around £600 and that's before even thinking about a gift.
She's since told me that they will be having a "rehearsal dinner" the evening before. I've never attended one before and I'm not sure if I'm being expected to pay for my own meal or is it generally assumed that these are covered by the hosts? I'm a bit concerned as I can't afford more expenditure but asking if I have to pay for myself also feels awkward!

Just for perspective OP, this is all completely mad. I got married 20+ years ago before the wedding craziness really started so view these kinds of shenanigans with a mixture of amusement and horror.

This friend is using your money to organise her wedding. So she’s not really a “bride on a budget”. She’s a “bride with her hands in someone else’s pocket”.

I recently heard of a young couple looking for a “content creator” for their wedding. Again, pleading poverty and wanting these professionals to work for next to free just so they could have their fantasies indulged.

I realise this is all cultural and probably impossible to resist but please just be aware that there are alternatives and this is grubby with major delusions of grandeur. Rehearsal dinner indeed!

Just ask her. And if you can’t, she’s not a friend.

😆😆

Priceless!

A wedding rehearsal is perfectly normal in Scotland and has been forever.
The "rehearsal: part in rehearsal dinner is a dinner after the wedding rehearsal, not a rehearsal for the dinner you'll be having after the wedding.

As PPs have said, another pointless addition to an already expensive day.

We sent out an informal invite to our guests to go for a meal the night before our wedding. It wasn’t a rehearsal meal though and everyone who came paid for themselves. About 15 people came and it was nice as they got to meet before the big day.

Hmm. There is not an event of wedding rehearsal dinner though. Going to the pub or something to eat after the rehearsal isn’t a rehearsal dinner.There isn’t an event called rehearsal dinner that one would recognise

If you are following the American tradition of a rehearsal dinner, the groom's family pays. It's a low key thing for those in the bridal party and immediate family.

It's not always low key, especially if out of town guests have been invited. I have actually been to two black tie rehearsal dinners. And I have been to several where there were upwards of 100 guests (including my son's, which DH and I paid for, but that's a tale for another day.)

Here in the UK there is no hard and fast rules as to who pays for the bridesmaids dresses etc. It often depends upon the bride's budget and the formality of the wedding. Traditionally she and her family take care of these expenses if they want all the bridesmaids to look identical and picture perfect. Where the bridesmaids want to buy something in their own style they often pay themselves. Or the expenses of the dresses and accessories may be shared between both parties.

I was only once asked to be a bridesmaid where I would have had to pay for my own outfit and accessories. I was a student at the time and declined due to lack of finances.

I would just say
’how much is the rehearsal dinner or can I order a la carte?’ And then just pay for what you order
I’ve been to a couple where everyone was invited to go out the night before and paid for what they ordered at the bar, I’ve also been to a buffet of food the night before

Wow, that is perfect!

Remembering that one for future use!

Sounds like you and your son didn't fully grasp American traditions tbh - sounds like you were quite rude.

I can just imagine the pushy UK wedding venues/planners saying “And aren’t you having a Rehearsal Dinner? Oh yes, it’s the latest thing!”

And so another US tradition (along with baby showers etc) is imported and Bridezillas everywhere fall for it.

Weddings nowadays must be absolute endurance tests for guests. When I was a child you’d go to the service and then on to a nearby pub or village hall for a ham salad or a chicken dinner. The happy couple left after the speeches and you were then free to go home without having spent a thousand quid fulfilling some narcissistic fantasy.

‘Hi. Bit skint this month and I can’t afford any more wedding related expenditure (assuming I’ll have to pay!). Sorry.’

You sound lovely, OP, but I think you need to have a little bit of fire in your belly over this! No wonder they can have a wedding on a budget when they’re paying for nowt! 😆

The idea of a rehearsal dinner just blows my mind.
Why do you need to make a big song and dance about the rehearsal, in the first place??

They are!

I went to a wedding on Monday, where everything was late, including the ceremony. All the guests got soaked, cos it pissed down literally every 2 minutes.
And, we didn’t sit down for dinner until about 17:30.

And, then, they did the speeches. 🙄
Before anyone had eaten so much as a bread roll!
My son was absolutely starving, bless him.

Be straight with her and tell her that as you're subsidising the cost of her wedding by buying your own bridesmaids outfit, you can't afford to subsidise her any further.

Make it clear, that you're subsidising her to have an A list wedding on a Z list budget. Don't be apologetic about it, you have already used up your allocated budget & there isn't anything spare left.

She really should cut her coat according to her cloth as the saying goes. She's a selfish friend, she's just interested in having an A list wedding at someone else's expense.

I love it how we import these traditions but not the tradition of who pays for them.

30 years ago my friend got married in her university town, so her dad paid for a buffet the night before as we and all her family had to travel a huge distance. It’s the only time I’ve been to anything like that.

We did our wedding on a budget. I still paid for the bridesmaid dresses (they wore their own heels), hairdresser and the hotel the night before the wedding. My hen party we called in favours from friends and got free drinks and free activities.

When on a budget, it doesn’t mean you should expect the bridal party to cough up cash. Personally, I feel that’s a bit cheeky to expect that tbh.

Never heard of such a thing in the uk - we had dinner the night before and welcomed anyone who had arrived from out of town to join us, I didn’t pay but it was a cheapish place where you could just have a drink as an alternative and as neither of us had had a stag/hen this doubled up as a pre wedding Drink!

Do you have to ask AI when making all decisions in your life? Surely if OP wanted an AI response she could have asked herself?

Same here.

We got married in 1987. Hen dos were a thing, but it was a night out with my adult bridesmaids for a few drinks then back to my place. DH's stag was similar.
Our wedding reception was a lovely buffet in the village hall and my sister had decorated the tables with flowers she bought on the market. Definitely no video! No official evening do as we left about 7pm, but I gather the rest of the guests decamped to the village pub for the evening.

Still happily married 37 years on. Unlike BIL/ex-SIL who got married 6 months before us and threw the kitchen sink at the thing. It had been in the planning for at least two years and they had all the bells and whistles that had been thought of at that time, including a video. Marriage lasted less than 10 years I think.

It would be interesting to see if there was some sort of Wedding Cost / Length of Marriage Index - Pounds per year.

Not normal.
Your friend is a cheeky fxxker.
I have heard of quite a few, "thanks but no thanks" to requests to be a bridesmaid from friends with daughters over the past year.
They said strictly only very very best friends.
My niece was a bridesmaid 11 times in her large circle of friends.....ffs, nightmare.

I think it's important to remember that in the US, there is usually no separate "evening do" as often happens in the UK with a two-tier guest list. There is one reception after the wedding that everyone who is invited to the wedding attends. Many weddings in the US, especially in the South where I am, are at night, followed by the reception. So the rehearsal dinner does not add any particular stress to the attendees. I can see that adding a dinner the night before the 10 to 12-hour extravaganza that some UK weddings have become could be a bit much.

There’d need to be a rehearsal for The Rehearsal, probably!😀

Btw - no offence to American pps where this is a long tradition. But it’s not in the UK, and what with these ‘multi-day, overnight stay(s)’ weddings it just seems to be piling on the strain and expense…which is OK if the couple or their families are paying. But there seems to be a worrying trend for some cheeky couples to pass on the cost of their Insta fantasies to their guests.