Once you have your wedding ceremony and reception site booked, you can realistically begin thinking about how many guests you may invite to your wedding. An important consideration is your budget: Feeding your guests well is not only very important in showing your hospitality, but one of the most expensive aspects of your reception. The more guests you invite, the higher your food and liquor bills will be, not to mention the added cost of extra seating, table settings and centerpieces for each table. You may prefer to invite more guests and cut back in other areas of your budget. But before you begin verbally inviting people (or saying yes to people who personally invite themselves!), it's well worth your time to sit down with your fiance and make a final decision on the maximum number of guests you will be able to invite.
Deal the Deck
In all likelihood, your parents will want to invite their nearest and dearest friends to watch with pride as you and your future spouse take that walk together down the aisle, and if they're helping you foot the bill, they really should be able to have some say in the guest list. And then you've got family to consider, along with your friends and those important professional colleagues you'd really like to attend.
One relatively simple solution comes from Anna Post, author of Do I Have to Wear White? Emily Post's Answers to America's Top Wedding Questions (Collins, $11.45 at http://www.amazon.com/, who suggests assigning 50% of the guest invitations to yourselves, the bride and groom. Then assign 25% of the guest list to each set of parents. You can always allot leftover invitations one of you doesn't need to those of you who do.
Who's In and Who's Out
Who is so important that you can't imagine not inviting? These guests include your intimate family and friends and others who have been important people in your lives forever. But if you have relatives you are not close to and haven't seen for years, you might send them a wedding announcement instead, as well as friends who have moved very far away and there's no chance that they can or will attend. Sometimes, however, it's worth it to have a few extra invitations handy to send to your very special family and friends who live far away even though you know they won't be able to make it, and then don't include these people in your total guest count.
Who is not welcome? This may include ex-spouses, ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends--it's something you and your fiance need to discuss. You may prefer an adult-only affair and not want to include children, or plus-guests for your single friends and relatives (this really ratchets up your costs). People who drink too much or who have a history of disturbing, disruptive behavior, especially if you are not close to them, should go into this category, as should people from whom you are estranged.
Plus Guests
This is the time to decide about whether or not you'll invite plus guests. If you've got the space and budget, no problem! However, the more guests attending, the more your wedding costs will be. Some couples invite plus guests of single friends when they know there is a definite relationship going on and/or they at least know the name of the plus guest. However, if there is no room in your budget for the plus guest, you should make it known before the invitations are sent out, in a general manner, that singles should refrain from bringing a date with them. And as their invitation will not be addressed to "Mr. John Doe and Guest," there should be little confusion in the matter.
Office Politics
Office politics can get sticky-- you've probably announced your upcoming wedding at work and believe it or not, the million-dollar question in the break room is who will be invited and who won't. If you have a small group of co-workers you regularly hang out with and text after work and on weekends, by all means invite them, but there is no way it can (or should) be held against you if you don't invite everyone in your office! If you work in a really small office of six or less and you have a close working relationship, you might consider inviting them, but it's not a good idea to exclude a person for a petty reason that really won't matter in a week. It's perfectly okay to invite your supervisor or boss, providing he/she knows who you are and you have a good, comfortable working relationship. Just don't use your wedding to brown-nose-- it will be pretty transparent to the person you're inviting and most likely will not get you that promotion or raise!
What About the Kids?
Some people heartily welcome babies children, and the more the merrier. Others put an age limit on children attending, and others choose to not invite anyone under 18. If you are planning a morning or afternoon wedding, it's more appropriate for having youngsters attend--it's daytime and they're normally awake. Evening affairs are a bit different-- these weddings are more for adults, and children tend to get cranky when they're up past their normal bedtime, especially with so much excitement in the air.
If you decide on including children, you might want to provide on-site child care to keep the kiddies busy. This way the parents can enjoy the wedding without having to constantly keep an eye on them. If you would rather not include children, your wedding invitations will reflect this by the distinct absence of the children's names on the envelopes. Some parents don't "get it," so you can let it be known, before the invitations go out, that children are not invited.
There will always be a mother who won't understand why she can't bring her little darling to the wedding, but remain polite and firm; tell her that you've already had to tell other guests "no" and it wouldn't be fair to make exceptions. It the parent threatens not to attend without little Johnny, express your regrets and don't feel guilty! You must draw the line somewhere, and you can't please everybody. Besides: Mom will have had several weeks' notice beforehand in which to find a babysitter.
Of course, the children you'll want to invite are your own children, and children in your wedding party--there is good reason why they are at your wedding. You may either arrange for someone to take them to a sitter off-site after the ceremony, depending on age and temperament, or allow them to stay and enjoy the reception.
Shuffle and Cut
Now that you've got your preliminary guest list completed, it's time to begin to shuffle and cut! Sharon Naylor, author of 1001 Ways to Save Money...and Still have a Dazzling Wedding (McGraw Hill, $12.00 at http://www.amazon.com/) suggests creating categories:
- Close family members such as brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, grandparents, first cousins.
- Best friends and extended family such as second cousins and those who've been around so long they seem like family.
- Other friends, pals, buddies, etc., colleagues and co-workers.
Now you can begin cutting the list from the third category up. It's better to cut out the entire third category (friends and co-workers) and avoid hurt feelings and misunderstandings in general than to cherry-pick in the first two categories. If you don't invite second Cousin Ethel and do invite second Cousins Ribby, Ed and Martha, odds are they will figure it out and wonder what poor Ethel's ever done to deserve this snub! Add all your desirable "cut" guests to your "B" list.
David Tutera, celebrity event planner and host of the the TV show My Fair Wedding suggests, "Ask yourself, have I seen or spoken to this person in the last year?...If the answer is no, odds are that you can keep them off your must-have list." And what about that friend who keeps blowing you off every time you're scheduled to go out to lunch together?
If you've guaranteed that 100 people will show up and only 85 are planning to attend, it's perfectly acceptable to call people on your "B" list and personally invite them, even if it's a week or days before the wedding. Be careful to use some tact here: Whatever you say, don't tell them that you don't have enough guests attending, need a live warm body to fill an extra seat, and she's that live warm body!
Lay 'Em Out
In two final lists, "A" and "B," that is! When you're doing your final lists, this is the time to gather certain information that will save you loads of time (and panic!) later: Gather the following information for each guest:
- Guest's full name as well as nickname, including title (Mr. Mrs., Ms. Rev. Dr) and suffix (Junior, Senior)
- Complete addresses including apartment numbers and zip codes,
- Contact numbers
- Email addresses
- Note marital status
- names of children and/or plus-guests invited
- Note of who's coming in from out of town.
- Make space for an RSVP response
Deal 'Em
Once you've completed your guest lists, you can now safely hand the work of data input, addressing and mailing your invitations to your wedding planner or whomever is in charge of this task. Invitations are sent out about six weeks before the wedding; eight weeks for out-of-town guests. Choose and buy your invitations early if you plan on having a calligrapher address your invitations, or if you are having a wedding that involves a lot of guests from out of town, as you will want to send Save the Date cards at least six to eight months in advance. If you're having a destination wedding, send these Save the Date cards out at least a year in advance to your guests can plan and save in order to join you in your exotic locale!
This is GREAT, Susan!!
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