is it rude to charge guests at a wedding

reply to post by margret68


Yes, it's rude.
I wouldn't attend your wedding if you invited me, then asked me to help pay for your party. Especially since I most likely would do without some things in order to give you a present picked out especially for your special day.

yes but its not like we are putting in big writing on the invitation cards `donation excpected` is it
we are simply thinking of having a donation box at the entrance, and guests if they wish may contribute

What you do is get a bucket, a karaoke system, bottles of the cheapest vodka in the supermarket and a few things to mix it with and put a sign over the bucket, 'Open mike!! - donation's very much welcome'.

You have this set up live from the very moment the service begins, you will have some interesting version of journey or Tina Turner blasting out as you say 'I do'! Pure win

Welcome to ATS

reply to post by margret68


Thats tacky.
My daughters, all three got married at one time or another. One of them we had the wedding in our backyard. Our house was packed with peeps. It was great fun! And nobody had to pitch in a cent. We paid for it. It was actually quite inexpensive. Two other daughters got married at the courthouse, outside on the square. We even got a few univited guests. Why not? Let's celebrate! One of those two we had the recption at our house. The other, I talked to the local National Guard and they gave us their faciilities to have the party. They were all wonderful familiy events that our daughters will remember fondly. Although two of them have since been divorced. I can't imagine how silly I'd feel if I spent thousands of dollars for parties for a couple of failed marriages.

Welcome to ATS, by the way! May your stay here be longer than many marriages last.

reply to post by margret68


Even a donation box would be considerd Unbeliveably rude, The familly of the bride and groom (commonly the bride) Will cover all the costs of the wedding Otherwise your guests will not be happy and it wont be a Very memorable day at all, Its not a Birthday party, Its your wedding.
Cant afford it? Go for something less extravagant. But certainly dont ask guests to come celebrate "YOUR" special day when they are expected to in some way pay for it

Originally posted by margret68
yes but its not like we are putting in big writing on the invitation cards `donation excpected` is it
we are simply thinking of having a donation box at the entrance, and guests if they wish may contribute

"Yeah but"?
Which part of "it's rude" is hard to understand.Just IMHO these giant ridiculously expensive wedding gala's we see on tv (i.e. "bridezillas") are getting a bit nuts.(why start out married life up to your eyebrows in debt?) Give up the fire eaters and the pink giraffe....Nothing wrong with a small family wedding by a "justice of the peace"...Just my opinion..

You could make a gift basket and raffle it off by selling tickets.
You never know what you could make off it.

Yeah, it is... Very rude. If you do that... You might just find that people turn right around and leave...

Welcome to ATS!

I would totally leave if I was expected to pay to get in. Likely I'm already bringing some kind of gift for the new bride and groom.

And if you insist on it, instead of a 'donation' box, there is something called a 'money tree' that I have heard being used. I'm not familiar about the particulars but I have seen the idea on wedding invitations. You could google that.

Can the guests charge you for the wedding gifts they bring? Or is that rude?

Here is what you do.Dont charge anyone at the door.You set up a roullete wheel at the reception.Hire a skilled dealer for the game.Everyone will be so drunk,they will be betting their asses off.You should make big money.If you really want to rake in the cash,set up a small dancestage with a few strippers and a pole,make sure they are real hotties.Make a deal with them to split the profits.Couchdances extra,of course.Good luck and have a beautiful wedding.

Yes, very rude!! People spend what they can afford on their own wedding. If family members want to help that is fine but one should never ask for money to go toward their wedding. If I went to a wedding and they ask for money at the door - I think I would just fall over

Welcome to ATS...one thing you will find is that people certainly aren't afraid to give an opinion.

As to your question; Ask yourself this: What do you want people to take away from this wedding? How do you want them to remember it and this special day that you have planned and dreamnt of? Because I can tell you right now, if you ask for money at the door (mandatory or not) THAT is what will be remembered and talked about. Not your dress or vows or flowers, but the fact that you were so tactless as to ask your guests for money!!

I don't know how old you are (I am guessing you must be very young) but I personally have never heard of such a thing. You should be getting an over-whelming impression by now that most people would be quite offended to show up as an invited guest with gift in-hand only to find that you are asking for money to enter your reception??!! I really can't believe that you would even consider this....this must be derived from desperation which means some extremely poor planning and I must say that this is not a good sign of things to come.

Good luck and I hope you take this asked for advice. It is really quite simple. If you can not afford what you have arranged than you need to change your plans. It is called being an adult. When you make a mistake, you fix it...not ask other people to pay for it.

One way around it is to have the dollar dance at the reception. Guests pay to have a 5 second dance with the bride or groom. And it's usually not a dollar. In my neighborhood, people would give a 100 dollar bill just as a gift for the new couple.

Just a thought. Welcome to ATS.

Originally posted by brindle
Here is what you do.Dont charge anyone at the door.You set up a roullete wheel at the reception.Hire a skilled dealer for the game.Everyone will be so drunk,they will be betting their asses off.You should make big money.If you really want to rake in the cash,set up a small dancestage with a few strippers and a pole,make sure they are real hotties.Make a deal with them to split the profits.Couchdances extra,of course.Good luck and have a beautiful wedding.

considering this is a religious christian wedding i do not consider that very appropriate

reply to post by margret68


A Real Christian wouldnt charge thier guests....

Just a thought.

Originally posted by margret68

Originally posted by brindle
Here is what you do.Dont charge anyone at the door.You set up a roullete wheel at the reception.Hire a skilled dealer for the game.Everyone will be so drunk,they will be betting their asses off.You should make big money.If you really want to rake in the cash,set up a small dancestage with a few strippers and a pole,make sure they are real hotties.Make a deal with them to split the profits.Couchdances extra,of course.Good luck and have a beautiful wedding.

considering this is a religious christian wedding i do not consider that very appropriate

Religious people cant play roullette or watch beautiful women dance?What kind of religion is it?Sounds more like a cult if you ask me.

reply to post by margret68

I empathize with you, but throw the party you can afford, and invite only the people who really matter. Logically, the reason for an ostentatious wedding is to demonstrate to your community how wealthy you are, sort of jockeying for rank. Begging for the means to pay for the wedding from the guests pretty much counteracts any status gaining you might have achieved.

Asking your close family to help, however, is traditional. Maybe ask your close relatives to cook and have a potluck instead of having it catered. Or ask them for money. But asking just the guests in general is tasteless.

Wedding traditions are getting pretty thin now days. Usually the more "non-traditional" the situation the more acceptance you will receive for the non-traditional style of the marriage.

What I mean is if you are a 25 year old never before married bride who has a two parent family the expectations will be greater than if you are 40 and have grown kids and this is your third marriage.

Likewise, should the bride and groom be "younger" than usual the expectation is more of a smaller intimate affair so they can save money for the important things in life - like food and diapers.

If you are older or have lived together and are already established people will likely give you cash as a gift which will offset some spending on the wedding but it is bad form to ask for cash for gifts rather than items. When I give a wedding gift I consider my relationship to the parties and the relative lavishness of their wedding. I spent about 600.00 on the gift for the couple who paid for our weekend out of town in a hotel - usually I'll just drop a $100.00 bill though if I don't know the people all that well.

In any circumstance asking for a donation at the door is bad form. Having people pay for their own drunken revelry is pretty much accepted now days with the caveat that you provide the wine/champagne for the first toast. Usually people meet in the middle somewhere and have a cash bar and provide a keg(s) and or wine. Sometimes you can buy a "bar service" that comes with a certain amount bottles and mixers and then it’s gone its gone.

A way to plan the wedding so that no meal is expected is with timing don't have it at lunch or dinner time and that tells the guests that no meal will be served. However, as a minimum light snacks (probably heavy hours' devours) should be provided at any hour as people will be drinking.

My wife and I had a non-traditional wedding (both our second marriages) that we paid for ourselves. We had ours at brunch with a few friends perhaps 30-40 at most. The alcohol bill was therefore minimal - we provided champagne for mimosa’s a couple kinds of brunch appropriate wines and a few types of lighter beers. It wasn't expensive - lasted for about 4 hours no one got silly drunk because of the time of day.

The older standards were derived from the father of the bride making a statement about his status to the local populace.

Do what you need to do to keep it in your means; I have never been asked to donate to a wedding at the door. However, there was one that had a "dance with the bride" fund - but that was a younger cousin in Indiana (supposedly that was a custom there). I think all told they made about 100.00 not a lot of cash for the drama IMO.

I have attended every kind of wedding now days from those where the Bride's family paid for everything even the hotels for outside of town guests for a weekend and they were whisked away in a horse carriage to the airport for a week in Maui to those where we had a BBQ buffet in the back yard. All were fun in their own way.

Anyone who will judge you for your choice to have a smaller (less traditional) wedding is not someone you need to invite anyway.

Originally posted by margret68
thanks for all the replies, i understand your point but it would only be asking for 15-20 dollars each or whatever they can afford at the door its not like a huge amount

Welcome

My suggestion, explain the costs to your guests and have a donation bucket. That way nobody is inclined to pay, but if needed, they can optionally cover the costs.