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It’s all over the internet and through the magazines - cut your wedding budget by cutting your guest list. Some places say it nicer than others, but I think Martha Stewart’s people said it the most cutthroat way:
Be Ruthless with the Headcount.
Or check out this thread here at the ’bee.
I’m not super militant, out marching against the Wedding Industrial Complex (WIC), but something about this rubs me the wrong way. Good ole Merriam-Webster says that ruthless means having no pity, merciless, cruel. The wedding industry sets these standards of beauty and indulgence to the point where the average bride must RUTHLESSLY cut her guest list to maintain the American Dream Wedding.
Yes, limiting the guest list is usually a necessary evil due to space and budget constraints. I don’t blame the bride who has to manage unwieldy lists that are bloated by more of their parents’ friends then they can shake a stick at. However, for our wedding, we decided that our priority would be to include as many of our friends and family as possible. Children were not invited, but not because we wanted to save a buck - because we wanted our guests to have the freedom to enjoy themselves during our wedding festivities.
We invited our co-workers and have them in our wedding party - these people spend the most time with us and know us the best! We had to cut back on other budget items to accommodate the cost incurred by more guests. The little luxuries I’m told I “need” at our wedding’s price point have been thrown out the window.
At the end of the day, I hope that the industry doesn’t force you to be ruthless. Rather, I hope that your vision and budget allow for the dearest to your heart to join you in a momentous occasion!
How have you balanced the budget and your guest list? Did your venue dictate the number of guests, or did you find a venue based on your guest count?
Luckily, I want a small wedding, so I’m not necessarily being “ruthless” per say. The smallest we can physically get our guest list down to is 40. I would prefer only 25, but 40 is still a small number, so no biggie!
I didn’t want a large wedding, but I didn’t want to leave anyone out. Now 20% of my guestlist is friends of my parents! It annoys me, not because of the money (it’s their own money anyway, mostly), but because I don’t know who these people are!
We are making things work around our number of people. We will most likely have more than 200 guests and that’s pretty much dictated everything. We are just not in a position where we can cut 100 family members, close friends, and close family friends. So we’re making it work. ^_^
we picked a venue and found out how many would be a good fit. We are paying for the wedding, which also dictated size. Personally, I don’t like Martha Stewart, and don’t like her tips to save money. If you want to save money, steer clear of MS anything and do your own thing!
Uh I got married in NYC, where I cut every single aspect of my budget to the bare minimum and I still had to be ruthless with the guest list. Geographic location and budget make a big difference in these decisions.
We wanted know more than 100 so we arre doing adults only as well which really helped!
I told my family and future family that if I don’t recognize someone without having to be reminded who they are then they are not invited to my wedding. I know my parents close friends and have met all of my future in-laws close friends and family. I don’t want strangers at my wedding. I felt a little ruthless when I came up with the rule but honestly everyone we all care about will be there and no one I don’t know. We’re keeping ours around 75.
We wanted it as small as possible, so we were pretty “ruthless” with some extra relative son my FI’s side that we didn’t know well (or that I had never even met during our years together). I absolutely hated the idea that people I didn’t know, or who hadn’t been involved in our lives and wouldn’t be in the future might attend our wedding. But we definitely worked on the guest list as the first priority and the budget stuff followed.
My fiance and I are paying for everything ourselves. We’re inviting 95% friends and 5% family. My parents are deceased, and his parents don’t get to dictate that we invite [insert number] of their friends. And it’s exactly what we want. Our guest list will probably be around 150 people.
Very insightful post! I agree that it looks pretty weak to try to justify cutting your guest list way down but then turning around and spending money on stuff that isn’t necessary. The people make the party!!
Deciding to have a destination wedding has cut my guest list in half and has dropped our budget to less than I expected. Yes, there are some people I truly wanted there who simply can’t make it because of the destination, but all the really important people are coming (family and good friends) and I get to have the intimate wedding I wanted.
This is the part I am dreading the most. We are thinking of 100-150 tops, while my parents are thinking 150-200 tops. My parents are fairly social people, so they have a lot of friends that they want to invite. People I’ve never met and don’t know, but that my parents really want there. (partially to show off …sigh…and partly because they are their friends) Plus my dad is the nicest man on the planet, and so I know he will casually invite neighbors, distant cousins, and the nice lady at the grocery store to come for a drink (or 5)
I’m thinking I won’t know at least half the people there, but I feel evil being ruthless since they are paying the piper as it were. So yea, not looking forward to this at all.
We are not being ruthless with the guestlist - our most important factor was to invite everyone who has been an important part of our lives (or our parents lives!). So we are having 200-250 people at our wedding. The size of our wedding definitely ruled out smaller venues that I would have loved, or a Napa valley wedding I dreamed of, but in the end we will be surrounded by all those that are important to us and that’s what mattered the most.
Also I should mention that my parents are paying for the wedding so it makes it easier to comply with a more bloated guest list…I think I’d be singing a different tune if it was just mine and FI’s money.
Luckily we didn’t have to make cuts, for our venue or for our budget. But then we’re only having 90-100 people, so it’s not too bad. I can’t imagine the struggles those brides with huge families go through to cut the list!
We are having to be quite ruthless with our list. FMIL would like to invite every single person she has ever crossed paths with. Unfortunately, the venue we chose only will accomidate between 80 and 100 people, and FI and I are paying for the wedding ourselves. That being said, we are extending about 100 first roudn invites, not inviting singles with guests and not inviting co-workers unless they are also ‘out of work friends’. i feel heartless, but weddings are supposed to be intimite gatherings! in my opinion.
We picked the venue based on the number of people we are inviting. Our first choice could only hold 75 people max, and so we chose to go elsewhere. At the end of the day, the party and the people that make it are what matter to us, so we are cutting corners elswhere by begging, borrowing and bartering where we can.
The nice thing about our venue, there is not guest limit & I don’t have to share the space with another bride. They have different ways to set up the floor depending on the amount of guests too to make it look full.
I think the use of the word “ruthless” is probably the result of a lot of brides and grooms feeling like their guest list gets hi-jacked by parents and the feelings of other important family members….maybe ruthless is too dramatic and hyperbolic a word, but firmess about your boundaries around the guest list can be very important to people for all kinds of reasons. And for many, that isn’t correlated to satisfying costly visions from Martha. The guest list has the biggest impact on the mood and feeling of your day, so I’m not surprised that it’s usually a tough topic!
Only the closest ppl! People who haven’t really bothered to keep in touch in the last year most likely go the chop. Thankfully my parents aren’t like some overbearing parents I’ve heard about — since the FI and I are paying, we get the say!
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Mrs. Lamb, Norfolk Age and Occupation: 25, Homeland Security Consultant Fiance's Age and Occupation: 27, Graduate Student Engagement Date: January 2009 Wedding Date: January 2010 Venue: Trinity Presbyterian Church/Harrison Opera House About Me: I’m a Homeland Security Consultant with a tendency towards pulling office pranks, taking lunch breaks, and drinking Wawa shakes. I’m also an English major with a serious obsession with alliteration and rhymes. While I’m not keeping America safe, I’m training for half marathons and the Escape from Alcatraz swim. Or moving for the third time this year. Or baking. Or wedding crafting. Or crying about wedding planning. All the while, I’m getting myself into Lucille Ball-esque scrapes and making Jim Carey-esque faces. Our big fat Czech/Baptist/Jewish/Italian wedding is a combination of vintage eclectic, DIY, and little spoonful of sugar from our Event Coordinator. It’s going to be a Norfolk flavored wedding with the verve of an only-daughter-blow-out bash!
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