To booze or not to booze

In my circle, beer & wine are very popular. We will be doing a modified beer & wine hosted bar. We are having 1-2 signature drinks, frozen margaritas, and then a couple selections of beer & wine. That way we cover pretty much all the bases

This is really about your social circle. One poster in this thread said they’re having a morning wedding so alcohol isn’t expected. We had a morning wedding and alcohol was most definitely expected. The bar opened for the wedding party before the ceremony even began (11am ceremony, wedding party started around 9-9:30) and our guests went straight into a full cocktail hour at 11:30. In my circle, dry weddings are unheard of. I didn’t know they were a thing until I came to WW.

I think you should host some sort of alcohol. Free then cash is confusing. Even if it's just beer and wine, or 2 signature drinks.

Every single person at my small wedding knows me and my attitude in general and also how I feel about alcohol. They will be surprised that I'm allowing it.

You need to provide alcohol. Cash bars are rude and dry weddings are boring.

View Quoted Comment Good point! I think it was the wording that threw me off, but then I re-read my own comment and my wording sucked too. Apologies!

To answer your question, it’s not acceptable in most circles to have a dry wedding. You’re hosting your friends and family and should be able to do it correctly.

With that being said, only you know your circle and know what’s acceptable within it. If dry weddings are common practice, go for it.

Alot of people do dry weddings shockingly. Keep in mind....your wedding, your money. You do what you feel is best!

It really just depends on your family and friends

View Quoted Comment

This is the drink hoarding I referred to in a previous post. It's very rude to switch to cash, even if you give people a head's up, but worse if they don't get the memo

I've been to both kinds of weddings. If your family and friends love you and want to celebrate with you, they will stay no matter what. Besides, its sort of shallow to think alcohol makes or breaks the whole evening. They should respect your decisions as a couple, especially if you are paying for things.

We are having a dry wedding. Having alcohol at our wedding was not even a thought.

My FH will be five years sober next week, but we will still be serving alcohol at our wedding. We're serving two types of beer, one red and white wine, and margaritas for our guests who have traveled to be with us on our wedding day.

I think it's ok if they know ahead of time. I will be having a dry wedding as well. I will notify them on the invites ahead of time. So, if they feel their dependency on alcohol is greater than feeling the need to support me and the FH, then that is their choice not to attend. Heck, my own father might not show up or stay long but being around drunks gives me bad anxiety, and funny concept, but I'd actually like to enjoy my own wedding. I will have kegs of root beer, other sodas and NA beer for the ones who want the taste. We are paying for our own wedding and neither of us believe in going into debt for one day. So I wouldn't want to pay someone to come out to bartend and all the booze. Both sides are a majority of alcoholics so it could get very expensive, very fast.

You do what you want, do what makes your FH AND you happy on that day.

I think a dry wedding is acceptable for religious reasons or if the reception is in a church or other venue that doesn't allow alcohol. Otherwise, not providing at least wine and beer just looks cheap, like you are trying to skimp on hosting. And, frankly, doing it just that isn't expensive if you plan properly. I'm doing wine, beer, and soft drinks and having a bartender for a pretty low cost, certainly not enough to put us in debt, but we budgeted for it in the first place. You also can't control what people do, drunks are gonna drink, whether you bring it or not. If the choice is between dry and cash bar for money saving purposes I would go with a cash bar.

It’s absolutley acceptable! My fiancé and I are not having alcohol at our wedding, largely because the reception venue (a beautiful park near us) does not allow alcohol on the property... Our reception however will be over relatively early between 9 and 9:30pm. So at that point we plan on visiting a few local bars to have some drinks with our friends who chose to join us before heading off to our hotel for the night. Booze or no booze, it’s completely your choice... I’ve been to several dry weddings and several that had open/cash bars... It’s whatever you prefer!

Dry weddings are generally only socially acceptable when done for religious reasons, and even then you can expect some of your guests to complain about it. If you don't have a religious opposition to serving alcohol, you really should provide some sort of alcohol for your guests. People will forget what kind of flowers you picked, what your decor looked like, what was on the menu, etc., but they will NOT forget that they had to pay for their own drinks or that the wedding was dry. You don't have to have a full bar, but providing basic wine and beer choices will go a long way in terms of budget and pleasing your guests.

Another thing to note is that if you don't serve alcohol, some guests will drink their own. And if your concern is having a bunch of rowdy drunk people at your reception, consider that it's much safer for your guests to be drinking wine or beer provided by you and served by a vendor than for them to be pounding everclear out of a flask in the bathroom, which is what some guests will probably do if the wedding is dry/cash bar.

This is a know your circle of friends and family. My relatives can’t imagine going to a party without booze, so it wouldn’t be acceptable. But if you don’t typically have alcohol at your parties and that’s your normal, then don’t do it.

This needs to be up to you two. I would either do an open bar or a dry wedding though. No one comes to weddings with cash expecting to pay for alcohol. If it is the norm for your family and friends to have dry events then go for it. If that is not the norm I'd go with open bar but it's definitely up to you two.