MONEY MORAL DILEMMA: Should Grant and Tiffany charge for their wedding?

jeanjeanie_3

Yakyb wrote: »

can i raise a question.

whilst i agree that you should not charge people to attend a wedding.
where do you draw the line with invites?

i may be gettting married shortly and whilst i only want a small number there, say 20 or so my girlfriend want to invite near 100 (extended family so that she doesnt offend anyone)
now out of that 100 she probably only speaks to about 30 of them the others are cousins etc that she may only see once every two years.
now am i being a bit of a scrooge here saying that she should cut down her list as i dont want to be paying for people's food etc whom i dont know and she doesnt even like
i can see this being a real bone of contention in 12 months

When we got married we were in a very similar situation where we could either afford a sit down do for approx 40 or a self catered buffet bash for over 100. The mothers and an aunt did the catering ( and very nice it was) and we hired the local chuch hall. I wanted all my family and friends there as I was moving a long way from home. I can honestly say that I really enjoyed our special day as much as any of the big bashes we have been too, more so probably because we didn't have any of the worries over formailty etc. WE were marrying for love not the expensive bash and hence are still happily married 24 years later. A niece found herself in a similiar position lately and eventually opted for the do they could easily afford rather than go into debt. A friend with a good camera can also serve the photographer and the pictures are always so much more relaxed this way!

oldngrateful

MSE_Natasha wrote: »

Here's this week's hypothetical situation for you to cogitate on:

Should Grant and Tiffany charge for their wedding?

Grant and Tiffany have lived together for three years and their house is fully kitted out. They plan to get married locally next summer and aren't really in need of much; though the cost of the wedding itself will severely stretch their finances as it's likely to cost the equivalent of £75 a head per guest. Their idea is to let everyone know this, and simply ask for a contribution towards the wedding fund; yet they're worried people would rally against

Should Grant and Tiff charge for their wedding? Click reply to have your
say

Previous MMDs:

Should Paris split her winnings with Nicole?
Should super-rich Aristotle still buy bargain bin food?

I think Grant and Tiffany have a cheek expecting there guests to contribute to there wedding. They should look for ways to lower there budget.

missthang

Are you having a laugh! you can not ask your guest to pay to come to your wedding! where have you been? If you can't afford to get married you have three choices:
1) Don't
2) Save up
3) Cut back
I have been invited to go to a wedding next month and they have put in the invitation, we do not have a wedding list and if you wish (notice wish, not compulsery) to give us a gift we would like a gift of a monetary kind.
It is a very polite way of asking for money. This money will not be to pay for the wedding, they have been saving up for a few years. GOOD LUCK!

Vodkalover_2

I think if they was to change people would be insulted, when i got married family members paid towards the cost of the wedding ie, DJ, food, decorating the hall etc, instead of a gift. This may be a better option for them!!?????!!!:beer:

Vodkalover_2

I think if they was to charge people would be insulted, when i got married family members paid towards the cost of the wedding ie, DJ, food, decorating the hall etc, instead of a gift. This may be a better option for them!!?????!!!:beer:
typo error on first message Opppssss

oldhaggis

I find it very offensive to ask for cash. A guest should never be asked for gifts. They should be given voluntarily.

One of my European second cousins (who I had only met once) sent a round-robin e-mail to all friends and relations in his address book. He informed me of his forthcoming wedding and stated that as they had everything they needed (they had recently inherited grandma’s apartment and contents) they wanted cash donations only. These were to be paid into an ethical bank account. The cash would be used by the bank for charitable projects for one year. At the end of the year, the capital would be returned to them. Nice sentiment but as they did not even invite me to the wedding andt just asked for the cash I felt no obligation to part with my money. I sent a pretty card with good wishes by snail mail and definitely no cash.

When I got married (18 years ago) in true money saving tradition we did it all for under £500. I had an 18ct gold wedding ring (half price end of line). My good quality designer dress and jacket were half price in the sale and I used shoes and handbag which I already owned. OH wore best clothes he already had. We had 25 people to the wedding at the local register office. We arranged everything only a few weeks before the event. Thanks to some good advice from a work colleague who said that if you marry on a weekday you have your pick of all the best venues, we got a great deal from a local hotel. They produced a fabulous 4-course sit down meal with drinks. We had waiter service, fresh flowers on the table and proper table linen. The hotel people advised us that sparkling wine instead of champagne would cut the bill considerably and no one even noticed, as we had plied them all with free drinks throughout the event.

We telephoned our guests rather than issuing invitations and told them that we didn’t want any gifts. They all insisted on gifts so I produced a modest list from the Argos catalogue of stuff that we actually needed costing no more than £20 per item. We still use all of it and I often think of our friends when we do.

Angoose_T

I don't think it's such a bad idea. I thought about doing something similar when my (now) wife and I got married as we were in a very similar situation. The way I looked at it our friends would come along and have an excellent time whilst saving money against the cost of gifts. Whilst a reasonable number of family members wouldn't want to pay as it would probably be more than the cost of a present that we probably didn't want and therefore not come. Thus solving all the family politics problems in one foul swoop and guaranteeing everybody had a great time and were there because they wanted to be!

Despite it being a good idea, we went the traditional route. Wedding list etc and when we went 'round the stores where they were I felt terrible. It just didn't seem right walking 'round thinking shall we have one of them and a set of them!!

I say a suggested minimum donation is a great idea. Or pretend you're Greek and have a money dance!

trejoy

What a joke, no way would I pay to go to a co-habiting couples wedding. I don`t understand why people don`t get married first, after all that is the correct way of doing things, oh and then pregnancy happens not before.
Now I`ll wait for the angry replies.

trejoy

Only invite people YOU want at your wedding, people who will be genuinely happy for you because they care for you, nobody else matters it is YOUR day.
Ask your partner if she can say this for everyone on her list, if so, fair enough.

boggie40

my partner and myself are getting married this month.
we too have everything we want, so have made a wishing well for our reception wrote a poem and have basically asked everyone attending that if they wish to buy us anything for our wedding, we would be grateful for euros.
this was a good idea at the time, until we were given a villa in cyprus as a wedding present. cyprus don't have euros :mad:

but at least we won't need money for next years holiday...

personally if you word it right your family will understand, we budgeted for a £6000 wedding, but the cost is already at nearly £11,000.....
you pay for what you want at the end of the day.