Organising my first hen do! And Bridesmaid dress advice?

llh189

A friend of mine has asked me to be her bridesmaid, so the duty of organisng her hen do will fall to me.

Now she has previously told me want she wants - strictly no strippers, no games, no drunken nights out.

She ideally wants a weekend away in a spa.

Having done several spa breaks myself I know how expensive they are.

She also isn't getting married until very early 2013, in the new year I was thinking of getting a list from her about who she would like me to invite, so that I can ensure how that everyone has plenty of time to save.

It will probably be £600 ish each, for somewhere nice, full board and extra treatments.

When would you e-mail everyone?

I friend also suggested that I should ask people to pay in installments as the spa will probably want a deposit and most of the payment inadvance - I don't know most of the ladies going - how would you feel about this?

And any other tips and hints, you might think would be useful for me?

As an aside issue - having not been a bridesmaid since I was a child - do I offer to pay for my own dress?

We are thinking of using In The Light Box, me and the other bridesmaid must be in the same colour but I get to pick the style, I figured that by offering to pay - I'd get more choice over the style of dress.

Again is this OK!

MaggieBaking

I think £600 is hideously expensive... Did you mean £60??!

Even my favourite spa in the whole world http://www.hoarcross.co.uk/ has a 3 day 2 night package deal, full board including 2 treatments for £350pp.

If you're not bothered about which spa you go to you can always get a Groupon offer, they regularly have spa deals, including some overnight all over the country - obviously you can't book this in advance but you could start saving your money and book somewhere in early 2013.

I just think the amount of money you're asking people to spend is too high so you might not get a successful number of people going. I wouldn't spend that for my best friend - at the end of the day you're asking people to splash out on a holiday with people they wouldn't choose to go on holiday with.

trying_2_b_good

No way I'd spend £600! Can get a week in Turkey for that! And there's no way that any one of my 11 friends that came to my hen do would have paid it either. Some have kids, some have low paid jobs, some (me!) are just tight!

We had 3 nights in a cottage, £80 each which included kitty money. We then cooked our own breakfasts, 2 evening meals, had afternoon tea etc. Then went out for one night and did our own spa treatments before going out!

As for dress - you can offer! There's split opinions on here as to whether or not you should pay for your bridesmaid dress.

74jax

llh189 wrote: »

A friend of mine has asked me to be her bridesmaid, so the duty of organisng her hen do will fall to me.

Now she has previously told me want she wants - strictly no strippers, no games, no drunken nights out.

She ideally wants a weekend away in a spa.

Having done several spa breaks myself I know how expensive they are.

She also isn't getting married until very early 2013, in the new year I was thinking of getting a list from her about who she would like me to invite, so that I can ensure how that everyone has plenty of time to save.

It will probably be £600 ish each, for somewhere nice, full board and extra treatments.

When would you e-mail everyone?

I friend also suggested that I should ask people to pay in installments as the spa will probably want a deposit and most of the payment inadvance - I don't know most of the ladies going - how would you feel about this?

And any other tips and hints, you might think would be useful for me?

As an aside issue - having not been a bridesmaid since I was a child - do I offer to pay for my own dress?

We are thinking of using In The Light Box, me and the other bridesmaid must be in the same colour but I get to pick the style, I figured that by offering to pay - I'd get more choice over the style of dress.

Again is this OK!

Surely you mean £60? I don't think anyone would pay £600 for a hen do.

SailorSam

When i first read the title of your thread,
'organising my first hen do'.
I thought how many hen nights does this woman think she may have in her life.
But now i see, it's not you is it.

Mrs_Moore_To_Be

£600??!!!
No chance would I spend that on a hen weekend and I wouldnt have wanted my guests to pay that for mine.
Hopefully you meant £60. I would look out for groupon deals if you want a spa break, or keep an eye out for offers on some nearby.

Are you sure the hen would want it to be that expensive!?

becca0417

Also look on lastminute.com there are some fab deals on there (although nearer the time). No way would I be able to afford or want to pay £600 for my own hen do, let alone anyone elses.

TimBear

£600 is too much!

My friend is getting married next year and her bridesmaids have organised her hen do (in fact, she's getting two).

We are going away for a long weekend and it's got so expensive that half the girls invited aren't able to make it, and some of the others are going but for a shorter time than the hen herself. It's all a bit secret and the hen doesn't know too much about it and I just know she'll be so upset that lots of her friends can't make it.

The weekend itself with flights and accommodation for us is coming to around £500, plus we'll need spending money and I assume they'll ask us to buy printed t-shirts etc too.

PLUS they're having a local hen do too. All in all, I think it'll cost me around £700+ just because my friend is getting married. Although, now I think about it, it'll cost me more because that's just the hen dos; I'll need to pay to get to and from the wedding and recepion venues, drinks, a gift...


I think you have to be considerate to others - either on low incomes, or with children etc. It's a heck of a lot of money to ask people to spend, even with over a year's notice.

Do you think your friend would rather go somewhere perhaps not at the top of her wishlist and have all her friends there to celebrate with her, or only enjoy it with a few close friends who can afford to do so?

With regards to the dress, I'm also a bridesmaid for another friend. We haven't been dress shopping yet, but I would be happy to pay for a dress if she asked me to. I think I would leave it to her to ask me though, or at least suggest it, so as not to offend!

Janice2

£600 is far too much for a hen do, IMO. If she really wants to have a spa retreat and that's how much it's going to cost it will most likely end up with just a couple of you going, perhaps just the bride/bridesmaids/Mother of the Bride/close friends could do this??

You could have two hen do's for her - one spa weekend and another one closer to home so that more people can come along and share in the enjoyment without having to spend so much money. there are lots of things to do - cocktail making class, pole-dancing class, burlesque class, afternoon tea, theatre visit, meal out, overnight stay in a cottage, Jamie Oliver-type cookery afternoon, activity/adventure places, surfing lesson....

You can see what is available near to your home town - Groupon often have really good deals for these sorts of things.

BLUis

£600 is far, far too much to spend on a wknd for a Hen Party!

I have been looking at my own hen night with a company called Mojito. They have various packages that you can pick and choose - the one I have at the moment is Chester, 2 nights, 4* hotel, 2 30 minute treatments per person, breakfast for £117!

I thought that was expensive!

MaggieBaking

Mojito also worked alongside the hotel where we got married organising party packages for them. They came highly recommended from the venue wedding planer

http://www.theplacehotel.com/article/her-place-hotel-manchester/

(Just a note to say that we didn't end up using any of the packages as we went with much smaller hen and stag dos in the end.)