Rehearsal dinner cash bar- tacky or not?

Rehearsal dinners dont have to be formal in any means. You could easily do pizza and beer or soda and call it a day. You SHOULD have a dinner though if you're doing a rehearsal.

We did a cash bar. No one complained and they drank, a little.

For our rehearsal dinner, we didn't have any alcohol. My mother-in-law was paying for it and wanted to do a cash bar, but I didn't think it was right to host guests and expect them to pay. My dad is also a recovering alcoholic so I wanted to avoid him being around alcohol as much as possible. Nobody said a word to us about there not being alcohol. Our wedding venue was a hotel with a bar so after the rehearsal dinner (at a local restaurant) they could go back to the bar at the hotel and have a drink if they wanted to. I didn't really want our wedding party drinking a bunch the night before the wedding anyways so I didn't feel bad not providing alcohol to them.

Personally, I do not think it would be tacky to exclude an open bar for the rehearsal dinner. You are already having an open bar at your ceremony.

I'd go to the airbnb or hotel, order some pizzas, and bring in a few cases of beer/bottles of wine. It doesn't have to be a crazy formal affair

I think that's fine for the rehearsal dinner. I would, however, cover all non-alcoholic drinks. I'm assuming most of them would be soda with free refills anyway.

I wouldn't feel any pressure to provide alcohol at the rehearsal dinner.

You could always go out for drinks afterwards.

My future mother-in-law is doing our rehearsal dinner and there's a 99% chance that'll it'll be pizza or mac and cheese. I'm not going to state an opinion on that, as that's a bridge I'll cross when I get there...

View Quoted Comment Thanks, but it's almost 40 people with the party. They pretty much frown at hosting parties.

View Quoted Comment Yes, ok that sounds good and doable. We could host it at a brewery and bring in catered food.

View Quoted Comment I would def do pizza but we are 99% having pasta at the wedding and I want to switch it up.

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Chicken nuggets!

For real though, I ALWAYS get excited about chick fil a catering

Nope it is not tacky. My wedding has a cash bar. So go for it.

For our rehearsal dinner, we had "drink tickets." Everyone got 2 tickets, then after the tickets were used and they wanted more drinks, it was on their own tab.

If you invite someone to dinner, you should provide the dinner: food, drink, cutlery, chairs, table, napkin--the whole thing. "Here's your ice cream; chocolate sauce is a dollar extra" is tacky in any form and on any occasion. The host pays; that's a basic part of hosting, maybe the basic part.

View Quoted Comment Well I partly agree, but alcohol isnt a necessity. There are too many rules that come with weddings.

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Then don't have alcohol if you don't want to pay for it.

Weddings are sort of like the rest of life--lots of rules.

I'm doing mine at a restaurant that covers the meals and non alcoholic drinks! There is a bar there, so if they want something alcoholic, they can get it! We're having an open bar at the wedding, so they could pay for one beer at the rehearsal dinner!

I think that's totally fine. We provided 2 drinks per person at ours because my FIL didn't want to do a full open bar. I would provide dinner even if it's just pizza or something cheap.

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This is exactly what we did. My mom had a airbnb for that weekend. We had bought a case of wine, beer, waters- and ordered Mexican food for 25 people. Everyone loved it, in fact there was so much extra food that the "kids" were eating the burritos for breakfast.

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Yeah, we would love to do that but it will be close to 40 people. We don't have an airbnb big enough. Thanks, though!