If a contract doesn’t state it, do you feed the vendors?

If they're going to be working for more than a few hours, you should always feed them. Would you work without so much as a food break?

That said, your caterer/venue may have a separate "vendor meal" available, which is usually cheaper than whatever you've chosen for your guest meals.

Feed them but i would not do full price menu like your guests. No disrespect but they're getting paid to work.

View Quoted Comment Yeah my venue charges per head so I am just wondering if I should count them like a guest? I’ll reach out to my venue.

Wow 19 days until my wedding and I had literally never even considered this. One more thing to stress about ✌️ haha

As another pp mentioned, if they are working for more than a couple hours, you should offer/ask them if they will want a meal. You're likely paying a lot of money for their services, you do not want them to be hungry when you're hoping for their very best work. Daughter's DJ (who was working more than 7 hrs, ate his dinner at his set up, in order to keep the music going throughout dinner). The photographer didn't want to eat, but he did want a meal for his assistant (we had a meal for him anyway). We also provided meals for the DOC and her assistant and the two videographers. I think vendor meals were $40 (compared with the $150+ we paid for guests, including premium open bar), and the venue set their meals up in a separate room. Generally, photographers and videographers don't shoot while people are eating (kind of gross pictures), so it worked out well.

I wouldn’t expect someone to come work for me for 6+ hours and not feed them, whether I was contractually obligated or not.

Yeah def feed your vendors. As someone who works weddings, I get sad when there's nothing. Talk to your caterer. They usually make 5% over for vendors or if someone doesn't want something. It won't count to your pp headcount costs

My vendor has a cheaper price for meals for vendors, I would check with yours as well. I know we pay a lot for vendors but as a host I would give them food as well.

Ask them if they’d like to have a meal. I actually think it’s implied that you would have a meal for them. However some photographers prefer to bring their own food. So really you should just tell them you’re happy to have a meal for them if they would like, and ask if they’d like you to.


Also when you give the headcount to your caterer you should specify how many meals are “guest meals” and how many are “vendor meals.” Sometimes (especially if you’re having a cocktail hour with hors douevres) they’ll charge you less for a vendor meal because the photographers will just be eating the main course, not the hors douvres.

My venue doesnt offer vendor meals, so I asked my DJ and photographer if they would mind either us purchasing them a meal for before or if they would purchase a meal beforehand and we would reimburse them. Both actually ended up saying dont worry about feeding me, but yeah its definitely important to at least offer to feed them

It’s very nice to feed the people working for you all day: band or dj, photo, video , bartender

Thanks everyone for your input- I reached out to my venue and they said they would take care of them.

In my previous marriage at the wedding yes, I fed me vendors. Photographers, musicians, DJs, wedding officiant I added them all. If they choose not to eat that's okay. Plus its always good to have a few extra anyway if you're doing plate incase people who didnt RSVP show up anyway.... I had 5 people show up so I was glad I ordered extra plates.

My vendors didnt specify in theirs to feed them but i do feel like its courteous to especially if its going to be such a long time.

Def feed them.

i wouldn't want to be somewhere working for 6+ hours and not eat. I would never hire any vendors and not feed them. I fed my DJ and his assistant, both photographers and my 2 decorators. vendor meals are cheaper than a regular guest. my vendor meal was the same price as i paid per child.

I think not providing food to vendors, regardless of whether or not it is part of their contract, is a horrible thing to do. Unless its someone who is only on site for a really brief time (florist dropping off flowers for example), you should make sure everyone gets a meal.

Our venue is doing food, and they have separate lower cost vendor meals (they're about 1/2 the cost of a guest plate) and expect that we are decent people and give them an accurate count of all vendors so that all people get fed. My understanding is that the vendor meal is usually the similar to what the guests are eating but without fluff and extras - they don't get hors devours for example and the plating/accompaniments might be a bit different. Our per head count is for guests only, and there is a separate count for meals for vendors. If we have a guest who is filling a vendor role (say one of our friends is officiating) then we pay the guest price because they get the full guest meal and experience.

You could always just ask any vendor if they will be expecting a meal or bringing their own food, but I want all of my vendors to be fed and happy so they can do their best job, so I'm accounting for meals for all of them unless they specifically tell me not to.

Ok, thanks everyone for your input- I resolved the issue with my venue. Thankfully, they will be taken care of. I appreciate it.

They're going to working for hours without any chance to slip away to catch a drive thru meal. Just feed them. Most caterers offer discounted vendor meals.