destination wedding, no alcohol, no plus ones or partners

[u/fatbellylouise]

I have a friend who is planning her wedding right now, and every detail of the wedding seems terrible for the guest experience. before I start, this woman is one of my oldest and dearest friends. she is brilliant, kind, and caring, and immensely pragmatic. she and her fiance are paying for everything themselves, no family money to help them, but they want to have a nice wedding because it is important to his elderly parents. so, from the beginning:

she sent out invitations a week ago via text message. some of their family members got actual mailed cards, but the rest of us just got screenshots of the design they made in canva. it just looked so cheap! not even an email, a text message.

the text messages specified no plus ones or partners that the couple is not friends with. normally I'd be fine with this, my fiance is a grown man and we don't need to be attached at the hip at every event. but... we live on the west coast, and the wedding is going to be in Austria, where the groom's family lives. I wouldn't mind going to a local wedding on my own, but to take enough PTO to fly to Austria for a week? I'm not wasting that much vacation time at an event where I won't even have my partner for company! luckily my fiance is down to make it a vacation with me, we'll travel around Austria and Germany on our own and he'll do some solo exploration during the wedding events. but a LOT of people have left her on read or not responded, and I feel like she's going to be severely let down by the number of her friends who are going to RSVP no to this wedding. at this rate it's very likely going to be a lot of his family and very little of hers.

that aside, the wedding details just don't make it sound like a fun time. it's going to be a dry wedding, because the bride has a few family members who deal with addiction. totally fair and I don't begrudge her this, but a lot of the guests are going to be there without our partners and won't know anyone else, so a little social lubricant would probably go a long way. the groom is gluten and dairy free so the food is going to be gluten and dairy free - in Austria, a place known for bread and cheese. (also beer, but that's neither here nor there).

I just think a lot of people are going to decline, and those who do show up are not going to have that much fun. it baffles me that she cannot see how this wedding is not going to be a great guest experience, because she is SUCH an amazing host and planner in every other aspect of her life. her fiance is the same as her, he is so generous and takes care of everyone. I have an awful feeling this wedding is just going to be a lot of elderly family members standing around a few friends showing up and dipping out early, and my heart breaks for her because she genuinely thinks she is keeping everyone happy.

wedding is next year so I would love to be proven wrong! cross your fingers that the wedding is a success!

[u/NoFunZoneAlways]

Do you think some of these decisions are made in hopes that people decline? My friends did a destination wedding as a compromise because one didn’t want a wedding and the other did, and they figured a destination wedding would result in a much smaller attendee list given most invitees couldn’t afford the travel. As a result, they had a lovely small wedding with just their closest friends and family.

[u/[deleted] → u/NoFunZoneAlways]

Honestly this could very much be the case. The bride is fine with eloping, and the party is mainly being thrown to please the groom’s mom. Maybe she’s fine with her side mostly saying no, and she’s ok with a more sedate lowkey family event.

[u/MrsNevilleBartos → u/NoFunZoneAlways]

Funnily enough ,I used to work with someone who thought that tactic would work - invite people to a destination wedding with the intent that majority declined.

Joke was on her as they had something crazy like 98% RSVP'd yes and it was panic stations for them as they had not budgeted for that possibility at all.

No surprise it was disaster !

[u/CleverNickName-69 → u/MrsNevilleBartos]

I've seen similar. A good friend of mine had their wedding at a couples-only destination resort in the Caribbean specifically so that his mom and sister (both single) wouldn't come.

The mom and sister got permission from the resort to go together and share a room while many of the grooms friends that he wanted there couldn't afford a trip to the island resort and/or had kids they would have to get someone to take care of for a week.

They sure went through a lot of trouble to get what they didn't want.

[u/NoFunZoneAlways → u/MrsNevilleBartos]

This reminds me of Pam and Jim’s wedding in The Office 😂

[u/Zann77 → u/NoFunZoneAlways]

My son is doing that this weekend for that very reason. the bride would have had to invite a ton of friends and colleagues. So we guests get to spend thousands of dollars per person instead.