Your Presence is our Present

gwendilater

My fiance and i have a lovely venue booked for our wedding for December 2010.
I went to colege with a girl who's parents got married and used this idea where the guests covered the costs of their meal as their gift to the bride and groom.

This suits us down to the ground as we have been together for a while now and have aquired all the earthly goods required. Also with the lack of funds, all we would like is our friends there.

Since this is not the done thing and is a touchy subject, (apparently!) can anyone help us word the invitations to include asking the guest to attend and to cover the cost of thier meal as our present?

shoppergal

I think you're getting a bit mixed up. Your presence is our present means you don't expect any gifts, i.e their present to you is being there.

If you google it there are loads of verses you could include. Personally I think it's fairly cheeky and if I got an invite asking me to pay for my meal I'd probably be inclined to either not go or else buy a really naff gift. Most people will give money anyway and you could spread the word informally through parents etc.

But obviously each to their own.

fasterkitten

It's only a little less vulgar than openly selling tickets.

seamus

It's not very appropriate unless your wedding is small (i.e. < 50 guests) and consists only of very close friends and family who would accept such a thing.

As said above, you may as well ask people to send money with their RSVP, akin to buying a ticket to your wedding.

Some people will not give a gift which covers the cost of the meal, some people will not give any gift for whatever reason. Expecting people to cover the cost of their meal will either exclude these people or make them unhappy. Yes, some people will only give you €20. But you're not getting married to get gifts, so be happy to get anything.

The done thing nowadays is to give a cheque, cash or a voucher. However if you would prefer cash to anything else, perhaps something along the lines of, "We do not expect any gifts - your presence is you present - but if you wish to give a gift, a contribution to help us cover the cost of our big day would be graciously appreciated", or somesuch. That creates no requirement on anyone to give anything, but also clearly tells people what you would like.

Rest assured, you will still receive non-monetary gifts because some people have a traditional aversion to giving money as a gift.

I really think this is an awful idea - sorry but I do.

What if people can't afford to pay for their meal? Will they not be allowed to attend?

If you're dead set on doing this and essentially asking other other people to pay for your wedding. Then it should really be the cheapest possible venue around.

Alot of people will attend your wedding regardless, but they will be talking about you on your wedding day - and not for the right reasons.

Sorry to come across bitchy - it's not my aim - just hard to get my point across without it sounding a little catty!

Polar Girl

Definitely not a good idea. If I was invited to a wedding where any mention of money was made I would be put off going.

Mentioning money in an invite is always going to be vulgar/tacky.

Saint_Mel

Pretty sure I gave almost the same reply to a similar post before, but here goes again ... not to be bitchy but In my opinion if your inviting people to your wedding it should be because you want them to share in your special day, not pay for it.

Toots

Polar Girl wrote: »

Definitely not a good idea. If I was invited to a wedding where any mention of money was made I would be put off going.

Mentioning money in an invite is always going to be vulgar/tacky.

+1, if you must ask people to cover the cost of their meal (I have no idea how you're going to do that without sounding very cheeky) you'd want to make sure it's gonna be a damn cheap meal. Back when her parents got married, weddings probably weren't the massive money pits they often are these days. Do you mind me asking where you have booke? If it's somewhere that's charging €50 a head for the meal, I think that's asking a lot of your guests. I'd be very reluctant to put it in the invitation TBH.

puddie77

most couples who attend wedding in Ireland now a days give money in cards mostly anyway, usually it does cover the cost of both there meals even with a bit to spare, people must understand it cost on average 20,000 for a wedding these days guest who put off coming cause hey don't want to gift money really can;t have put much thought into what the day has cost ye.

puddie77

puddie77 wrote: »

most couples who attend wedding in Ireland now a days give money in cards mostly anyway, usually it does cover the cost of both there meals even with a bit to spare, people must understand it cost on average 20,000 for a wedding these days guest who put off coming cause hey don't want to gift money really can;t have put much thought into what the day has cost ye.

It does not have to cost anything near 20k for a wedding, that's a shocking amount of money. If you choose to spend that on your wedding then tough titty, noone is making you and it certainly isn't up to your guests to cover it.

If you don't want to have to pay for your wedding I suggest that you don't have such a big do. Have a party instead, the afters without the meal.

puddie77

my god your a bitter so an so...a wedding is a special day for everyone involved from the bride and groom to the guests, a typical couple always cover the price ot there dinner we were at 4 weddings last year and thats what we done..i hate to see what u gift

puddie77

puddie77 wrote: »

my god your a bitter so an so...a wedding is a special day for everyone involved from the bride and groom to the guests, a typical couple always cover the price ot there dinner we were at 4 weddings last year and thats what we done..i hate to see what u gift.......................plus a few quid in a card nowhere near cover the cost of a typical wedding its usually just gives a fration back for a bit of spending on a honeymoon or whatever

Toto Wolfcastle

I think what whoopsadaisydoodles was saying is that no one should expect their wedding to be paid for by gifts. There is nothing wrong with giving money. I do it myself. But people should spend what they can afford on the wedding and any money they are gifted is a bonus.

puddie77

Exactly janey... but it could have been done with a bit more tack the "tough titty" been a good example of bitchiness.

amdublin

You could sell tickets prior to the wedding. Or you could do it on the day ie. charge admission at the door.

Both equally tacky and cheap imo.

Or you could try not inviting people to your party and expecting them to pay.

The title of your thread is misleading. I believe the phrase is "we want your presence, not your presesnts" ie. we do not want any gifts.

amdublin

puddie77 wrote: »

my god your a bitter so an so...a wedding is a special day for everyone involved from the bride and groom to the guests, a typical couple always cover the price ot there dinner we were at 4 weddings last year and thats what we done..i hate to see what u gift

What does this mean?????!!!!!

Since when?

I give a gift (generally money) to show my best wishes/congratutions and to help the couple in their marriage.

puddie77

puddie77 wrote: »

my god your a bitter so an so...a wedding is a special day for everyone involved from the bride and groom to the guests, a typical couple always cover the price ot there dinner we were at 4 weddings last year and thats what we done..i hate to see what u gift

Bitter? How dare you.

For the past 3 years running I have had 4 weddings per year. I have always given money and it has always been alot more than what my dinner would have cost. That is absolutely not the point. You should not be asked to pay for your attendance at a wedding. It is rude and it puts pressure on your guests. If you want people at your party then you invite them but you should not ask them to essentially buy a ticket to your big day.

Absolutely ask that gifts be given as money as you have everything, but not to ask people to pay for their meal. Most people give money these days anyway.

To say that it costs 20k for a wedding and guests should appreciate that is ridiculous and I stand by what I said, if you choose to pay that much for your wedding but can't afford to cover the costs yourself then yeh, tough titty. There are plenty of cheaper options out there.

iguana

puddie77 wrote: »

Exactly janey... but it could have been done with a bit more tack the "tough titty" been a good example of bitchiness.

Enough of the back seat modding. There was absolutely nothing wrong with anything whoopsadaisydoodles said. I do however have a problem with you accusing her of being bitter. I'm not sure what you actually meant but there was nothing 'bitter' or bitchy in her comment.

Also please take care to write your posts properly, text speak abbreviations are not allowed and users should use capital letters and punctuate correctly. Posts are just too hard to read otherwise.

puddie77

i mean most couples going to a wedding usually give from €100 upwards in a card so this covers the price of there meal unless of course the meal is over €50 per head, thats in my opinion we had 120 guests to our wedding the bill for the meal including wine was just over 6000 and we received over 8000 in cards to which we were very grateful

Ickle Magoo

I would rather save up and pay for my wedding than throw a wedding I can't afford and expect the guests to pay.

You need to work within a budget and throw the wedding you can afford, if things are so tights that guests are expected to pay for themselves then I think you really need to re-evaluate whether it the right time, venue or scale to get married in/on. It isn't the audience paying to see you get married, it should be you paying to look after the people who have taken a day out of their own lives, to share an important day in yours.

If you can't afford to look after your guests, then you have no right to invite them - far less include a caveat on the invite that they have to pay to be there. :eek:

And just to throw this in also.

Do you have any idea what it costs to actually attend a wedding?

Generally a new dress for the lady, a new shirt, tie for the man, hair, make up, drink for the day and night, day off work, travel to and from the venue, accommodation if it's not close to home. And then obviously the gift. It's not cheap by any stretch of the imagination. So to actually put an exact figure on what is expected as a gift is, again, rude.

And before anyone says that the new dress, hair, make up etc are optional, I fully agree which is why I would never complain about it, I for one, love getting dollied up. As a valued guest I'm happy to make the effort to look my best for my friends most important day.

boogle

I'm sorry but has anyone ever heard of living within their means? If you don't have much money then have a cheap wedding. If I can't afford to buy an expensive designer sofa, I buy one from IKEA, I don't ask my visitors to cover the cost of my fancy sofa! If you don't want a cheap wedding then you wait and save until you can afford it. I think it's outrageous to be asking guests to pay for YOUR big day.

kizzabel

i agree
we saved weekly in the CU. this will enable us to only borrow 4k to go along with the 7k we plan on having saved by 2012. this is what we are happy to spend on our day.
we want our guests to enjoy the day, relax and celebrate with us. if they want to buy us a gift or give us money that would be greatly appreciated but not a prerequsit (sp?)
we just want to say our vows and start our life together as man and wife happy and secure. thats why we save so hard, so we wont be under huge stress in may 2012 after its all been had.
we would head to gretna with our children if our guests were not such an integral, important part of our lives.
you have to cut your cloth to suit but cannot be so barefaced as to ask others to sub up because you've taken it upon yourself to tie the knot

Lucky1218

I think it is not a good idea~~