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

emmamed

I think its a cheek to ask guests to pay for their meal. When my hubby and i got married in 2004 we asked for argos vouchers or money as we already set up in a house.

As said in a previous posting, if they cant afford £75 a head dont go for such a posh place.

You can get married on such a small amount these days with still having a nice day. Why waste £1000's on just one day.

We had limo, hotel hire, sit down meal and buffet for evening disco, my dress, bridesmaid and pageboys outfits and everything else and it only cost about £1600, just shows you dont have to go without to have a great day

colenso_2

Wedding gifts of household items is an outdated tradition as most people have set up home before they wed nowadays.

The request of money as a gift is not inappropriate, it depends how you sell the idea to people.

My wife & I married in Lindos, Rhodes this year for several reasons. Firstly in the UK your average wedding costs in excess of £15k. A hefty debt if you are paying yourselves. Our wedding including wedding dress & wedding party outfits, flowers, a dedicated wedding organiser, champagne boat cruise, photographer & photographs, beautifully decorated venue, wedding cake, meal for 20, free bar till 3am etc. PLUS a 2 week holiday for us and a 1 week holiday for the best man & bridesmaid.... COST £4,100!!!!

Doing it this way the people who are closest to you will pay to join you on your wedding holiday. All our guests paid for themselves. Plus you avoid inviting people you really don't want to and people who don't want to attend have the prefect excuse to say no!

In our invite we thanked those who were joining us & explained that we didn't expect gifts due to the expense they had gone to, but should they choose we were looking to build a loft room and contributions would be welcome. We did set up an Argos wedding list for those that felt a cheque/cash gift inappropriate. A majority of people donated money.

We had an open house party on our return inviting people round who couldn't make it to Greece to celebrate. We requested they bought their own alcohol and fed approx 30 people for about £100. Everyone had a fantastic time & again contributed gifts of money.

If you can afford £4k then a wedding in Lindos is stress free, the scenery is gorgeous, the hospitality second to none and the celebrations go on for 2 weeks. Check out www.exquisitelindos.com for more details. Charlotte the wedding organiser provides the most amazing service. You won't be disappointed!

Life today is expensive enough, especially with the rate of inflation. A wedding day is made special by who you are with, not how much you spend.

Most companies in the UK wack up their prices once you mention the word 'wedding'! £75 per head sounds like a lot of money for a meal. Is this for a traditional wedding 3 course, meat & two veg meal, served by silver service waitresses/waiters supplied by a local temping agency where the food is normally cold by the time its all served up? We paid 25 euros (approx £20) per head for a very tasty 3 course traditional Greek meal with wine & our wedding cake was YUM! Everyone had a fantastic time.

PLUS we had the time of our lives and are left with fond memories, not a mass of debt to cast a cloud over our special day!

Hope this helps!!!!!!

Ash1

We have received many wedding invitations in the past and they have stated no boxed gifts - this way you are not offending anyone and indirectly you are requesting all gifts as money

catkins

emmajon wrote: »

I also wanted to say the person who thought it was cheeky to have to pay for drinks at a wedding - I think its nice to provide a toast and perhaps the first drink at the bar but surely most of us would be bankrupt if we had to buy all of our guests drinks at the end of the night.

I hate the fact that at so many weddings now you have to pay for your drinks. When I got married we had very little money but made sure we paid for all the drink and we had about 80 people at the reception.

If couples spent less money on the flashy cars, big white dress etc even though they have usually lived together for god knows how many years then they could afford to pay for the drinks

banana_joe48

My daughter just got married and the cost was about £75 a head. I know that's a lot, but that's what they cost believe it, including hire of hall, catering, entertainment, church fees, choir, photographer, dresses, suits, flowers... it all adds up. Every guest expects to bring a gift don't they? Cheapskate if they don't. If you ask for money to help pay for the wedding, then that will grate a bit and people will resent it, as you've seen in the posts. We've been asked to a wedding with similar circumstances to yourselves, they've been together and have everything they need, but wish to celebrate the day with their friends and family. They've told everyone they are having a 'money tree' for contributions, and please don't buy presents. That's a much more palatable way of putting it, and I for one am very happy not to have the bother of going shopping and to give them what they really want, a cash gift. I have no problem with this at all.

harryhound

I went to a superb wedding in France. None of your overpriced hotel, trying to cater for ordinary guests at the same time, with some unhealthy finger buffet.

Held in beautiful flower decked municipal facilities with the Mayor dressed up for the occasion and all the guests decorating their cars (come on anyone can make flowers out of toilet paper) to parade round the town.
It was obvious that many of the guests had contributed to the food and decorating the hall.
Visitors has a choice of let-yourself-in-with-your-credit-card motels. (2 room family suite less than 50 GBP).

The performance got under way about about 11:00 and after endless food drink and entertainment, I flaked out some 16 hours later. (Getting a bit too old for some strange festivity involving chocolate and a chamber pot intended to disrupt the couples wedding night:D).

We were back on parade on the Sunday afternoon to help clean up after the day before, and have a "post mortem" about what a wonderful day it had been.

Weddings are all about good cheer and giving two young people, who hopefully are starting a happy life together, a memorable stress free day.

They are not a competition in conspicuous consumption at rip off prices.

Harry.

PS Anyone else remember seeing the "Thats Life" episode at a Greek wedding: The guests were busy pinning currency to the bride's dress, when a hand appeared and started unpinning ?

parker01

Grant and Tiffany should charge for their wedding if that is what they want, as long as they do it with etiquette. I asked for donations to my lounge/decorating fund and totally overhauled my lounge including fire place. What we included on the invitations with an insert. "Your prescence on the day is gift enough, we haven't got a gift list however if you would like to make a small contribution to our wedding fund, or they can even call it honeymoon fund instead".......

Weez

parker01 wrote: »

Grant and Tiffany should charge for their wedding if that is what they want, as long as they do it with etiquette.

Asking for presents and/or money is rude, therefore you cannot charge people and still follow the rules of etiquette - you can only do one or the other.

Fiona_T_3

I don't see where the word 'moral' comes into it. When I got married, we hadn't lived together first and we needed every gift for equipping our home, which I believe was the whole point of having a wedding list. in those long ago days. Nowadays it's just consumerism gone mad, yet again, and I agree with all those people who have pointed out that being married is the point, not getting married. If you want me to contribute £75 to a night out with you, invite me to somewhere like Le Manoir and I'll come along. Invite me to a huge hotel where drinks are £8 a glass of wine and the meal is dodgy at best, and I'll say no thanks! If you can't afford it, don't do it. Isn't that old-fashioned?

freelancemermaid

shouldn't we respond in the way the couple ask us to?

to be buying ever more "stuff" is unsustainable anyway.

as long as people word things so that they don't assume you'll buy a present or give in some other way, what's the problem?