Groom Duties

Cutting the Guest List: Plunge Success Story (Kind Of)

A reader comments:

“So, I’m the girl with the guys’ perspective here…

“My fiancé, Joel, wants the huge wedding, I want the justice of the peace… I’ve been fighting him like crazy about the guest list.

“I have 70 people I’m inviting for “my side”… He has over 300 he wants to invite. I am sooo showing him this article… maybe it will help convince him that he does NOT need to invite coworkers from the LAST place he worked.”

_______

Glad we could help.

It’s all about the kind of wedding you want to have. Yes, we know that’s a boring-as-hell platitude, but it’s also true.

There’s nothing wrong with having 70 guests. There’s nothing wrong with having 300 guests. If… IF…. These are people you actually like. If your fiancé is inviting 300 people because he thinks he needs to score points, schmooze, or win karma, you have our permission to whack him upside the head.

The reader commented on this below article, about the guest list:

Your wedding’s guest list is like the world’s supply of crude oil. Its supply and demand will drive every other cost of the global economy (your wedding); it’s contested by every superpower (the bride, the mothers), and it will trigger wars and bloodshed (your fights with the in-laws).

This is it. The biggie. As we’ve mentioned before, the size of your guest list is the one variable that will make or break your wedding’s budget. A few extra guests could mean the difference between an open bar and boxed wine.

Our overriding principle: don’t be afraid to be a jerk. No, not to your family and fiancée, but to any friends you’re worried about inviting. Think of it this way. When you’re not sure if you want to invite a friend, just don’t invite them. It’s that simple.

More specifically, stick to these 10 guidelines:

1. Follow the Rule of Thirds

Simple, clean, fair, battle-tested. A third of the guests for your family, a third of the guests for her family, and then a third of the guests for your (and her) friends. Will it work out that neatly? Nope, but it’s a good place to start and a tidy, objective method for avoiding tug-of-wars. Obviously this gets more complicated when one family is footing 99% of the bill. Theoretically the rule still applies (according to conventional etiquette), but if the Paying-Family wants to fork over even more money to invite more guests, fine, as long as they’re not shafting the non-payers (i.e. Payers have 100 guests, Non-Payers have 20.)

Get the rest of the article here.

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