How big is TOO BIG?

Were having 10 people total in our wedding party, that's including us LoL. My fiance wanted a small wedding about 100, but his family is HUGE, and so is mine. Were having 200. Every person ive talked to say 200 is plenty. You also have to remember everyone you invite wont show up. So invite 400 but not all of them will show up. I personally think 400 is WAY to big. Like you said it has a price tag and if your on a tight budget that'll be a tough one.

To tell you the truth, you probably wont end up inviting 400 people. You will go through you guest list so many times and each time you always get rid of some people. I orginally had over 200 people on my guest list and we ended up with about 100. And its true not everyone you invite will show up. So sit down with your fiance go over you budget do some research about cost per head. And your not being unreasonable, you are right a big wedding party is ridiculous in my opinion, and a lot of people means a lot of money, and not to mention more stress! unless he is willing to help out significantly.

Don't argue about the number of guests. Set your budget and stick to it. That will dictate a lot of things, starting with the number of guests. The cost per guest begins with the print cost of the "save the date" cards and invitations, then the postage. And it keeps adding up. There's seating space at the wedding ceremony, then there's the reception food, drinks, cake, and it just keeps adding up. It will surprise you how fast it can sneak up on you. It did us.

Just start going around and finding your vendors and ESPECIALLY your reception site and the catering amount. The cost of all that in itself will get your fiance to change his mind. I'm using the budget on WeddingWire and I'm still WAY over the initial amount I had set myself. So you show him the $$$ and ask him how it's going to be paid, and he'll change his tune and be more reasonable.

We have an agreement. If we haven't spoken to or heard from someone in 365 days, they are not invited. If they did not acknowledge our engagement party, they are not invited. That trimmed the list tremendously!

Glad it worked out!

Hello Marie,

I think just like you because a wedding should be something small & memorable for your guests. However, I was also having the same problem since my fiance also wanted something big. I was able to make him change his mind by telling him that if we do something small we will be able to save money either to purchase our house or to go on a honeymoon. Maybe you should use this technique to make him realize that you should be prepared for the future rather than spending it all now. I really think that 100 to 200 people are more than enough to have a wonderful time. Good Luck!

I've been to weddings before where they have a huge bridal party, and it makes it gaudy. I have never met anyone who thought it was 'nice'. and the last wedding I went to, I could not see the bride(i was sitting closer to the far end of the pew)because they had to wrap the girls in a half-moon shape to get them to all fit. and think of your pictures...getting all those people to look at the photographer with a pretty smile all at once...

We are NOT inviting ANYONE who has not personally me both of us(excluding out of state family). just something to concider.

And if your getting help from family to pay..ask him to concider paying for the wedding himself...once he sees the price tag, haha.

or what I had to do was ask myself "would I take these people out to dinner for a non-special-occasion $50 per person meal?" Thats what helped me pick my caterer and to not go overboard.

Are you really going to have the time to go around to 300 to 400 people at your wedding and acknowledge them all...I belive any more then 200 is just to much and your not going to enjoy your day with that many people.Just invite the people who mean the most to the both of you.

We just had the discussion and we ended up cutting back. We had 168 people on our original guest list after our $15k budget jumped to $19k my better half saw red and decided to blame me for the budget getting out of hand. Mind you it based on his 91 guest that he feels should attend (whatever). Needless to say I told him in order for us to get back o track we need to make som major cuts so he was able to get his list down to 68 people and I was able to scale back on a few things because we now have less guest. So we are now looking at about 127 and I estimate that 5% to 10% of those will not even show. I couldn't see myself hosting wedding with over 400 guest, you wouldn't be able to enjoy yourself that would be to overwhelming.

I agree that you should have your close friends and family part of your bridal party. So to the individual who said that large bridal parties are tacky,I beg to differ. We had 15 on either side, 36 including ushers. We invited 250 guests, 198 showed up. My photos are WONDERFUL and everyone talked about how much FUN they had at our wedding. Our bridal party was positioned so that everyone could see my groom and I with no problems. We had just the maid and matron of honors and the two best men sit with us at the reception, and let the rest of our party sit with their guest. Its all about planning and being organized. I liked the "if you haven't talked to them in x amount of days" suggestion. That was great! We paid for our own wedding, and we used the now common practice of "If you aren't married or living together or in a relationship for at least 6 months, you can't bring a date." I am not feeding the usher Scotts floozy he randomly chose from his black book at 50.00 a pop.