Small wedding of Immediate family vs. Big wedding

Not much advice, our wedding is about $35,000. If you can host a big wedding (and by host I mean properly with good food, open bar, music, and a seat for everyone ) for $6000, then go for it. I think thats a cheaper wedding in the spectrum of things and thats what alot of people spend on a "small" wedding

We went for a smaller intimate wedding. We had to cut out aunts, uncles, and cousins and sure we got a few comments but for the most part they were all very supportive. I don't know how you could do 180 for 6,000. We are doing 56 and everything from dress, rings, food, DJ, photographer, etc is 8,000.

$6000 for 180 people is pretty inexpensive! How are you planning to pull that off?

Intimate weddings are great because of the time you can spend with those nearest and dearest. Big weddings are awesome because you have everyone you know there and don't have to leave anybody out. Personally, like intimate weddings. My FW and I wanted an awesome honeymoon, to buy a house next yar and to be able to take our boys somewhere out of the country for their birthdays. We know we can't have those experiences for ourselves and our kids and a big wedding. Ultimately we've decided that we can shrink that list, still have an AWESOME party and do the other things. So why not? Just our preference, though.

I figure you only get a wedding once your in life ! Go big or go home ha you'll never have the chance to have all your family and friends together again like this

Perhaps a destination wedding or get married on a cruise? You could certainly find package deals that include that, then everyone who wants to come would be responsible for their own fare and it would help limit the guest list while still providing an excellent experience and simultaneously taking some of the blame off of the guest list.

The question is "How can I host 180 guests with $6K?" The answer is, quite moderately. You'll probably have to skip cocktails and who knows what you'll serve them.

It's far better to scale that list down to immediate family only. Then, and only then, could you host them beautifully. People understand the costs of big weddings. If you can't do it, don't. It's better to go smaller and host beautifully than it is to host tons of people sparsely.

We are having a fairly large wedding. 200 guests, about 125 are family. Our wedding is costing us about $25,000. So 6K is very inexpensive to me! If you can do it, do it!

I went from a guest list of 100 people to 45 ish. 50 max. So.. small to smaller and we are budgeting 10k just to cover all our bases and make sure we are properly hosting. Reasons for a smaller wedding 1) I prefer intimate, 2) I have terrible anxiety and don't really want to wander around talking to people I barely know all night, 3) way more cost effective, we probably won't come near that 10k budget, 4) less stress!!. As far as people being upset, we are expecting it, but they'll get over it.

Smaller wedding for sure! Less stress worrying about how to properly host your guests and budget that's stretched thin. I think that more intimate weddings have far more pros than cons.

side note:

We'll be having 60 guests from what I can tell (RSVP date is still a few months away so may be a bit more or less). We invited 80 and narrowed it down by not having kids (not for numbers reasons but beachside we wanted an adult party), doing only immediate family (siblings and parents) and inviting only people that we had spoken to in the past 12 months. All single people will be getting plus ones and I'm super happy that we'll be having a smallish wedding. I want to be able to speak to everyone and to host people properly.

I think you'll find that you have fewer, not more, hard feelings with an immediate family only wedding. It's a lot easier to say "Our budget really wouldn't allow for more than immediate family" than to say "We invited 180 people, but you still didn't make the cut."

Having planned the 250 person party, I am wholeheartedly #teamsmallwedding. We have 25 people invited, immediate family (and one best friend each, you know, the brother from another mother and my BFF who is my sister in every way but blood). No stress, being able to be focused on WHY we are spending all this money instead of the BS details that no one will remember anyway.

With one exception (who doesn't matter anyway, as FBIL baby mama wouldn't have been invited anyway - long story - order of protection barring contact with other family members), everyone was super supportive, and completely understood why we cut it down so much. It is a lot easier to explain that "we are having a very intimate wedding with immediate family" than "sorry, you can't come to the wedding because of budget constraints".

I had immediate family only and it was fabulous. And none of our extended families were upset about it; they understood we wanted to keep it small. I absolutely don't regret it. It was intimate and elegant, and was everything I could have hoped for. No family drama, everyone got along, there weren't numerous pieces coming together. It was smooth and DH and I could focus on us getting married.

That being said, it was a DW with 9 people total and we spent around $17k. So smaller guest list doesn't always mean smaller budget.

We originally planned for a big wedding. We placed deposits for a historical mansion in Long Island, a photo booth (Lumi8 is amazing!), DJ, quartet, photographer, florist and jazz band within 6-8 months of being engaged. But the planning quickly got out of hand- suddenly, we were gonna have a live cigar roller and a live painter.

This wedding would've been for this May 19, 2017.

In August of 2016, we ditched our original plan and decided for an small wedding. We still kept our original photographer and florist, but cancelled everything else.

We got married at our dream venue on December 23rd, with 35 guests. We celebrated with an intimate dinner after. 0 regrets! I love that the only people at our wedding were those who are the most important to us.

You cannot have an 180 person wedding for 6K. It's just not possible to properly host your guests for $33 pp. You have to provide a catered meal and, at least, beer and wine. Our bar cost more than 6K for less people...

We had 148 people at our wedding. We spent roughly $36K on our day (not including honeymoon). It was totally worth it to us to have a big wedding. It was an amazing feeling having everyone you love in one room. I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

You can't host 180 guests on 6000.00. That is just the facts. And really, do you even LIKE all those people? Have you talked to them three times in the past year? Do you think you'll be able to even talk to them all over the course of the evening?

The answer is no.

Then don't do it.

For 6000.00 you can do a beautiful wedding for 30 people, the people you don't invite will understand that you kept it intimate and you can really enjoy it.

Make a list with FH of your must-have people. You'll find there's probably 25-30 on that list. Everyone else would be nice to have, but not necessary to enjoy your celebration. With a smaller group, you can actually be in the moment and enjoy your time with each guest. Since your budget is $6K, I'd go with quality over quantity.

Totally depends on your priorities. Yours meaning you and your FS, not the rest of your family (unless they are pitching in &dollar. If you truly want to invite all 180, you will need more than $6,000. This means perhaps waiting longer to save up more money or making cuts to your budget wherever possible, sacrificing things for a one day party.

Similar to pp Ali, we had 56 guests and it cost about $8,000 in total. I did get some comments from family ("why didn't you invite so and so?") and politely explained to them that we were having a more intimate wedding. When pushed I had to state we have a limited budget and want it to be more special to us and everyone there. It did get pretty stressful but I'm glad we stuck to our guns! It was nice having a smaller wedding with the people most important to us.

If you are a more social person or used to having large family gatherings, etc. maybe you could have a guest list somewhere in between?

I am team small wedding. Once you get above 40 people you can't even really talk to all the people you've invited. And if I like them that much, I'd rather have them over to dinner later or hold a family reunion or something so we can talk! Weddings can be so hectic; I'd rather enjoy sharing our love with those who really know us best.

If your family has done lots of weddings that requires traveling, they will understand if you need to limit the wedding size. The older folks know how expensive weddings can be.

A neat idea from one of the weddings we did -

The couple had family and friends that could not be there. Someone from their bridal party captured small video clips of the family and friends who couldn't make it. This was played back during the reception. A very nice way for folks to "be present."