Open Bar vs. Consumption Bar

I know that I would never drink 6 drinks in 2 hours. I don't know of many people that could. I would probably lean towards doing the consumption bar.

I think the consumption bar will work for you. When I stay at receptions for a little while, I see the first two drinks fly, but after that, someone has to drive, and people just slow down.

I also think the open bar is going to be too much after the first three hours.

It's a destination wedding, if that helps a bit. Guess I should've added that. But still, I agree, that I am thinking it is just too much.

I attended a wedding this last weekend which had open bar. The ladies that I was sitting with each consumed 6 drinks in the first 2 hours. I on the other hand had 1 drink in 2 hours along with a Coke. It happens especially before dinner.

I'd stick with consumption. That is a lot to drink. In the first three hours I would already of had enough and might drink one more per hour after.

We have some big beer drinkers in our group and I still don't seem them drinking 3 drinks per hour in the last 2 hours. Usually once people start dancing and cake comes around, they pull back a bit.

We are also going out after the wedding because it ends at 11 and I know people are taking advantage of Uber and hotel shuttles so we considered that drinks may not slow down.

Also consider that part of the last 2 hours is going to be Last call too. We are doing last call at 9:30 so everyone has time to get and enjoy their last drink before we head out at 10.

What is a consumption bar exactly?

It's a tough call. It totally depends on your guests. Do you have a lot of older guests who would slow down or leave relatively early to go to bed? Or mostly a younger, partying crowd?

If it's the former, I would do consumption. If the latter, I would probably stick with the flat fee. I have actually seen the drinking pick up later in the evening with a younger crowd as the dancing gets going, not slow down. I could especially see this at a DW.

By the way, they are both an "open bar". Open bar just means drinks are paid for by the host. It does not indicate how the drinks are paid for (flat fee vs consumption). Guests don't care how the bill is paid. It's open for them regardless of the fee structure for the hosts. This seems to be a common misconception.

Definitely do consumption. There is no way, after three hours of open bar, every single one of your guests is going to be drinking 3 drinks an hour.

Consumption tends to be better unless you have a lot of drinkers. Over half of my guest list doesn't drink so it's consumption for me

@MFB thank you

Thanks everyone! I was definitely leaning more towards the consumption option, but figured I'd throw it out there.

We had a consumption bar which really was an open bar. Our guests had unlimited access to drinks but we were charged per bottle rather than per glass. For 35 people, our alcohol tab was $2,000.