How do I decide who makes the guest list?
Finalising your wedding guest list is one of the biggest and hardest tasks you’ll face when planning your wedding day. Coming up with your final numbers and then deciding who those people are is not easy - and there are certainly bound to be some back-and-forth discussions about these decisions.
Questions you may be asking yourself already include:
* Who gets a plus one?
* Do we have to invite all of our extended families?
* Do we have to have an even number of guests for each of us?
* Can some guests just be invited to the ceremony and not the reception or vice-versa?
* Do we really have to invite kids?
Keep reading below for all the advice on how to tackle these questions and as a bonus, I’ve also included some scripts you can use to help you with those awkward conversations that may pop up once you’ve sent your invites out.
ALL OR NOTHING RULE
Even though it might add up to more money spent, treating family equally will keep family fights and tensions down. This means if you invite one aunt, you should include all aunts (and obviously, uncles too!)
The same rule as above applies for cousins - but your fiancé doesn’t have to do the same with their side. Each family should be looked at separately and by closeness. Then apply the “all or nothing” rule.
CEREMONY VS RECEPTION
It’s totally fine to have a small ceremony and bigger reception. Or to have a big ceremony and a small reception. You do you babe, it’s your wedding day!
This may require you to have different sets of wedding invitations, as some guests are only invited to certain parts of your day. Most invitation styling include details on both the ceremony and the reception so it could be an idea to split these details over two - and having the larger part of the day as the main invite. Then you can slip the details for either the ceremony or reception (depending on your decision) into the envelope to ask for their presence.
If adding another set of stationery is going to tip you over budget, you could invite certain guests by phone or with a handwritten note, and then send the same invites to everyone on your list.
FRIENDS
Friends’ names that you can list without even thinking about are must-haves. Then you need to have a list of “maybes”. These are the friends that you’d love to invite if there is room in the numbers and your budget. You could have an A-list and B-list of guest names - and for every guest that can’t attend your day from the A-list, a guest from your B-list can then be invited. Just make sure that you have enough time to send out the B-list invites for collecting RSVPs.
NOTE: This is an option you could use, but you definitely don’t have to.
WORK COLLEAGUES
It’s completely up to you if you want to invite work colleagues - and even then, it doesn’t have to be everybody. If you’re wanting to stay quiet about your plans, ask those that you have invited to keep the details to themselves. If anyone asks, you can always say “We’re having a very small wedding,” or “We have huge families and most of our guests are family.”
KIDS
If you are choosing not to have any kids at your wedding, make sure you address the invitation to the parents only. You could include an extra note on another card in your stationery to say that you can help with finding babysitting if they need some help. Another option is to also call the parents before you send the invitations to let them know it’s a child-free wedding.
DATES + PLUS-ONES
This can be a tough one - and not everyone needs to have a plus-one. Our advice for this is if your chosen guest has been in a relationship for over a year (or a timeframe that you choose) their partner should be invited as well. They should be automatically invited as a couple if they live together, are engaged or married - even if you haven’t met them. Just because a guest is single, doesn’t mean they get a plus-one. It’s perfectly acceptable to invite just them.
EVEN NUMBERS
In short - no, you don’t need to each have the same number of guests to invite. You probably have different sized families and also have a lot of mutual friends, so it’ll probably be a hard task to marry up your guest numbers. Focus on those guests that you couldn’t imagine not being there with you on your dream day, and go from there.
COVID
Ahhhh, the dreaded C-word. Both such a blessing and a curse too.
Blessing : a great excuse or reason to have a smaller guest list/family only wedding due to venue limitations, travel restrictions and border closures.
Curse : a reason you have a smaller guest list, with travel restrictions and border closures still in place that could mean certain guests definitely can’t attend.
It’s definitely not a fun discussion to have with guests if you are having to cut your guest list due to a postponement or rethinking the original plan for your dream wedding day.
Most people should be completely accepting and supportive of your decision to keep your wedding small or limit guest numbers but there are some that may ask why their invite never arrived.
But, no matter how “upset” someone tells you they are, or if they are threatening to end your friendship, do not let them make you feel guilty and renege on your decision. You decided not to invite them for a reason, and you need to stick to your guns. You could consider a livestream or hosting another get-together in the future to celebrate with other guests that didn’t make the cut.
At the end of the day, people just want to share in your dream day celebrations with you and will be happy for you, no matter what you decide or who you choose to invite.
If you’ve made some hard decisions while finalising your guest list and find yourself having to have a difficult discussion with some of your guests, take a look at our conversation scripts here. I hope they help you with any conversation you may find you need to have!