AIBU to set a hen do budget that may exclude some guests?

[CheekyTealFawn]

I’m the maid of honour at my best friend’s wedding, and I’m currently trying to organise her hen do.

The bride wants nothing to do with the organisation or planning of it, or to even know anything about it until the day arrives. Though( she has given me a few must-haves, a location and a list of people to invite.

I asked everyone for budgets before I started. One said £100pp for accommodation, another £150pp. The rest said £300-500. The brides sister also refuses to share a twin bedroom.

After weeks of searching I’ve realised I simply can’t find anything I’d actually want to take the bride to within those budgets. Everything in budget is either miles from where we want to be or frankly a bit grim.

I’ve now found somewhere I think she’d genuinely love, but it’s £250pp for accommodation alone if everyone shares rooms. This is the nicest I can find at the lowest cost pp. I plan to keep other costs down by cooking for everyone and keeping paid activities to a minimum, which I know the bride would enjoy as she just wants to relax.

I’m thinking I should just book it and tell people that’s the cost. I feel really uncomfortable with the idea of excluding 2 people. But I don’t see how I can justify booking an awful place I know the bride would be disappointed with and potentially even disgusted by, or a nicer place in a more affordable place that she doesn’t want to go to. But then again, the bride really wants them there.

My boyfriend thinks I’m being unreasonable and should speak to the bride about changing her hen do idea so everyone can come. I think it’s impossible to cater to 15 different budgets and so someone has to compromise, but it shouldn’t be the bride.

Expecting her friends to spend hundreds on celebrating her wedding before the costs of attending said wedding have even been factored in, I'd have thought.

Be honest and speak to the bride about budget differences and the reality of what the lowest one will buy. No need to name specific people. Just gather her thoughts about your next move.

Why can’t it just be a few drinks down the local, OP? Nice and easy for everyone, and affordable.

You need to at least read the OPs posts. Quite a few of the guest list need to travel and will need to stay somewhere. There is no option of “few drinks and everyone goes home” because the homes are too spread out with several people who live overseas, but have said they will come to the uk for the hen do.

Surely the bride must know differences in income or commitments of her guests? Maybe not.

But these hen parties that go on for a long weekend are pretty selfish, when you consider the cost of wedding on top.

I've no real answer, but I do think the bride needs to know the issue. Maybe she could pitch in to ensure everyone she wants is there?

Sorry, not read full thread. Maybe this has already been suggested? I know I'd bridge the financial gap,if I could. And keep it quiet.

I'd hate the idea of people being left out just because they couldn't afford it.

The only other option is to put around a round Robin, saying you'd done your best but this option was the best you could come up with and leave it to the guests to decide if they can manage a bit more? They can say No, afterall. I have in the past. I decided it wasn't worth the money and I couldn't afford it.

I do hate the expectations of expense after expense just because someone is getting married. It's divisive and selfish.
Just my view, though. I eloped in secret so no one was put out or caused expense.

We have a similar sized freind gathering every year and for one of the meals we get a massive lasagne from Cook and have salad and garlic bread with it. It works out at about £6 each for a beautiful dinner.

This is EXACTLY what I was going to say! Expectations have gotten ridiculous. Weddings are expensive enough without spending £££ for a whole weekend. For mine (15yrs back), we went out for a nice meal and night out with a wide group of friends....then just closest family (me, sis, sis in law and neice) stayed over in an apartment that included access to sauna and hot tub. Everyone had a great night and we had a lovely little overnight stay and nobody had to spend the earth ££!
Can't be doing with baby showers either! Never had them in my day. Why do we have to follow the Americans like sheep? If you want to do it, fine, but it shouldn't be an expectation.

In this case the OP said that the invitees were scattered and they needed overnight accommodation because not everyone is local.

I'm genuinely a bit baffled that people can't grasp this. I don't know any adults who only has friends that live in the same immediate area as they currently live in, so I've never been on a hen do where it could have worked without accommodation.

Amen sister
it’s just ridiculous

I have this week turned down a weeks invitation for a friends 50th to Tenerife it’s beyond mental!

This. I'm so glad I'm past all this shit in my friendship group.

People keep asking why hens (and presumably stags) have become like this.

These events used to mark a rite of passage, marking big changes in the persons life. 50 years go, if someone was getting married, it probably meant that:

• they were leaving the family home
• they were setting up with a partner for their own family life
• they were about to lose their virginity

So the hen do wasnt really a thing in itself, it was just the means to mark these big events happening. Thats why people were happy with a meal and drinks locally etc.

But none of this is true anymore, for men or women. A marriage, if it means anything at all - and lets be honest, most ppl today see it as non-unique & wholly disposable - its just really the formalisation of a relationship.

There are no big changes in a persons life anymore. The couple likely already live together. Most women live alone for a period too (a good thing to experience) and have been banged all over town by the time they get married lol😂

And so the hen do (or stag) isnt a rite of passage any more. It doesnt mark any big change in the persons life. It really is quite meaningless today and is really just done for its own sake. And so this is why some people want it to be as glamourous, flashy and expensive as possible.

Another consequence of this is (in my perception) that, in an effort to find some meaning in these events, some people now view it is a night / weekend of being able to take license that they usually would not get away with. This is why there are all the depressing 'traditions' like strippers/"dares" (cheating) etc.

Like the huge costs and time investment, these also upset people but they don't seem able to speak up about it or feel they simply have to accept it.

This. When DH and I married the only local guests we had were our parents.

Oh..thats a shame....it's lovely to still have "old" friend's from when you grew up who have known you for decades

I don't disagree but I was bullied a lot at school and couldn't keep anyone from those days in my life. My parents are very insular people, I suppose at least that meant that they didn't produce a massive list of people that they expected us to invite.

It's fine, we moved away and both got lucky and made some friends in the new place.

I think you’ve missed a different cultural shift, and one I mentioned on a previous thread about “isn’t it terrible to have weekend away hen dos!”

It’s marrying later and the rise of the friend group holiday. (Linked to cheap flights)

My mother went her whole life without ever going away on holiday with friends. She holidayed with her parents, then when she got married, she started going on holiday with my dad. She never holidayed with female friends.

I on the other hand, got married in my late 20s, and by then had been on quite a few “girls trips”, sometimes holidays abroad, mainly UK weekends away. I’m late 40s now and it’s normal in my friendship group to have a weekend away together without DHs and DCs each year. Dh also goes away with his friends.

So if a group of friends regularly have a weekend away now and then, doing that to celebrate a stag/hen do doesn’t seem that odd. Problem is with hen and stag dos is you end up with a wider guest list that can incorporate some of the “only holiday with family or partner” types.

And that’s before you factor in people being more mobile- the “just go for dinner, club and home” idea really only works if you have stayed in the town you grew up in and all your friends are also local. My hen do had to cater guests from Manchester, Sheffield, London, Nottingham, reading and the Kent coast. Wherever we’d held it, hotels would be needed.

I can see how it started with having a lot of guests that need to make it an overnight stay to well if most people need travel and an overnight stay it might as well be a mini break to somewhere nice.

I'm so sorry, that must've been tough.
I'm very glad things improved for you :) xx

Good point about the modern group holiday and how these can be adapted to stag/hen events.