Potluck Weddings: Are they Tacky?

[SKL]

I wouldn't invite 100+ people to my wedding, but that's just me.  :P

[JumpyTheFrog]

We had a lunch time wedding during one of the slowest wedding months of the year, each of which may have lowered the price. The buffet was about $13-15 per person and the food was actually decent. I would not have wanted to deal with renting tables and chairs and all the setup and cleanup that a potluck would involve.

 

I think church members working together to cook and serve food is fine because it would be both economical and not burden the guests to cook or the couple's family to stress out over cooling/heating food and finding enough outlets.

[FaithManor]

I wanted to invite three - me, dh and a witness off the street. Let's just say our ideas about weddings weren't culturally compatible.

LOL, boy do I get that! Dh and I wanted our closest friends from college and our immediate families plus the pastor. This would have numbered roughly 50 people. My parents attended a large church maintaining they would be socially ruined if they did not invite them all. Invites to 450 people, and 350 attended. Since dh was from Florida and the wedding was in Michigan, he had all of 25 people there. Though we instructed the groomsmen that they were not to ask "groom or bride's size" and seat the sanctuary evenly, either they ignored this or people got up and moved. The church sat 550 people....325 people crowded themselves onto the "bride side" leaving his 25 alone on the other. It looked stupid and uncomfortable! I have no idea why all of these people thought this was a brilliant plan.

 

Gah...it was overwhelmingly loud at the reception, overcrowded everywhere, and uncomfortable. I hated it, dh did not enjoy it, and two hours into it announced we were leaving.

 

So when dd said, "Mom, M and I do not want a big crowd at our wedding", I held the line despite people from our current congregation hinting they were going to be profoundly miffed if they didn't get invited. Too bad. Just because we attend the same church, that doesn't mean we are bosom buddies and I am not fighting the bride to get you a seat.

 

We invited 90 and had, if memory serves, 75 or 76. It was lovely!

[LucyStoner]

Here is the thing.

When you're invited to a wedding, there is the assumption that you are going to attend, it's pretty much a command performance, because it's a special day, a new beginning, a time to share the joy of the couple and bless them with your presence and a gift.

 

So it's not like a typical 'take it or leave it' potluck where you can just not go if you don't feel like it or feel like cooking.

 

That more or less obligatory nature of the invitation makes further demands particularly onerous.

????

 

Wedding invitations are not subpoenas.

 

You can decline.

 

In the middle and lower classes in the US, big weddings are a 20th century invention driven by consumerism. It was far more traditional for your friends to gather at your home to cook the day before or for extended families and close friends to bring a dish to your home to share after the minister married you in the sitting room or garden than to have a $$$ reception.

 

I see potluck weddings are a return to that earlier pattern rather than tacky. If I care enough about someone to receive and accept a wedding invitation I am too busy being happy for them than to care about the details of the food. I've been to some perfectly lovely potluck type weddings.

 

My wedding reception was self catered brunch- the best man and I were literally cracking eggs minutes before the ceremony and we spent a day making muffins and homemade granola a couple of days out from the wedding. Inexpensive doesn't equal tacky.

[FaithManor]

We had a lunch time wedding during one of the slowest wedding months of the year, each of which may have lowered the price. The buffet was about $13-15 per person and the food was actually decent. I would not have wanted to deal with renting tables and chairs and all the setup and cleanup that a potluck would involve.

 

I think church members working together to cook and serve food is fine because it would be both economical and not burden the guests to cook or the couple's family to stress out over cooling/heating food and finding enough outlets.

I think that is great too! There are very few churches in our area that do that anymore, but it's a nice idea. We have a few churches that still do funeral dinners but they are few and far between. This is the kind of thing that used to fall to the women because there used to be a fair number of women not working outside the home who felt they could be flexible enough to do a dinner on two or three days notice. But with the economy so bad, most women are working outside the home and are no longer available. It's hard on the families of the deceased because in addition to the horrendous costs of the funeral itself, now they pay to cater a dinner and the cost is astronomical because you have no way to know how many are coming. The caterer overcooks so there is no chance of running out of food and yikes, that's a lot of money! We are starting to see a trend of "private funerals" in the area because it's just not affordable to pay the catering costs for large groups.

 

One of the things that is popular here and the expectation is HIGH is the graduation openhouse in which a ridiculous amount of food is provided to a lot of people for a three or four hour period. Even self catering it, many families spend at least $500 and $1000 is not unheard of.  I went to one this past summer in which inflatables were rented, an ice cream cart was provided, and the buffet easily had 20 different dishes plus a professionally decorated cake plus a DJ! Boy would I have liked to coordinate that event! It would have been fairly easy and a nice chunk of change. LOL

 

[Erin]

I've never heard of a couple opening their gifts at the reception so I'm surprised that upset people.

Not usually during the reception itself, but it's pretty typical to open them Sunday morning...

[FaithManor]

????

 

Wedding invitations are not subpoenas.

 

You can decline.

 

In the middle and lower classes in the US, big weddings are a 20th century invention driven by consumerism. It was far more traditional for your friends to gather at your home to cook the day before or for extended families and close friends to bring a dish to your home to share after the minister married you in the sitting room or garden than to have a $$$ reception.

 

I see potluck weddings are a return to that earlier pattern rather than tacky. If I care enough about someone to receive and accept a wedding invitation I am too busy being happy for them than to care about the details of the food. I've been to some perfectly lovely potluck type weddings.

 

My wedding reception was self catered brunch- the best man and I were literally cracking eggs minutes before the ceremony and we spent a day making muffins and homemade granola a couple of days out from the wedding. Inexpensive doesn't equal tacky.

No one has suggested inexpensive is tacky. What we have suggested is that given we are a mobile society and most weddings these days involve travel, and many times for a significant number of guests, a substantial travel and therefore a lot of expense to them, then asking them to provide the meal is inappropriate.

 

What you describe above harks back to a society in which brides and grooms came from the same community and so did their family. This kind of thing is easy to coordinate when everyone lives within 15 minutes of each other. That just isn't the reality of modern life. Dh and I met in college and our families and friends hailed from numerous states. This was the same for my sister, my cousins, my daughter, my husband's siblings, and most of our friends. 75% of dd's guest list were at least two hours away, and almost half were 500 miles away. In the "good old days" these individuals would not attend the wedding. In modern times, most out of town relatives and close friends expect to be invited, and many will try to attend so it really complicates matters. Ultimately, even the potluck wedding of ole was for upper middle class. It was more common to have a tiny private ceremony without a party afterward.

[LucyStoner]

I've never been invited to a potluck wedding that was a travel situation. Usually if the family and friends can afford to travel, the couple or their parents can afford and prefer catering. I've been to weddings that cost $60,000 and weddings that cost $600. If I care enough to attend, I care enough about them to not judge them for how they do the reception. These are our loved ones. Why judge our friends and family at a happy time?

[poppy]

I think weddings should be about celebrating a couple starting their life together. How the food gets on the table for that celebration doesn't matter to me because to me that's not the point of it. If I were invited to a potluck wedding, I'd go with a joyous heart and a dish of food to help people I care about celebrate a new phase in their lives. I'd be glad that they weren't going into debt or sticking their families with a large bill to have an elaborate wedding. I realize many people can afford their catered receptions, and that's fine, but I don't think that choosing to spend a lot of money on wedding food makes one somehow better (less tacky) than those who take a more economical approach.

Thing is, not one person here has suggested spending a lot on wedding food is better.

 

When I was growing up almost all the weddings were soup bread rigatoni cake done. Cheaper than potluck overall, no burden on guests, not fancy but who cares? It's about the couple, not the food.

[MrsBasil]

I attended a potluck wedding several years ago. It was a lot of fun!

 

It was a second marriage for friend/neighbor who had recently gone through an awful divorce to a real jerk. They were on a tight, tight budget. The bride and groom asked local family and friends to bring a specific dish and that plus attendance would be the best gift of all. She asked me to make my spinach artichoke dip. I was so happy for my friend and honored she liked something I made well enough to have it served at her wedding.

[kitten18]

Ok, let me explain; maybe I can answer some of the questions in this thread (not just yours, marbel).

 

The potluck idea for the wedding I attended yesterday came from a conversation among several ladies in our church, myself included. The bride was upset because the couple could not afford to pay $4000 for catering ($20/person), so it looked like the couple was going to have to cut their guest list by 75% in order to be able to pay for catering at the reception. That 75% included everyone from our church, as well as their friends and co-workers. She felt that she really needed to provide a meal at the reception, but she thought it would be rude to have a reception that only family members could attend, so the only solution she could see would be to just invite family to the wedding. We told her that if she made it a potluck, she could count on her church family to provide the food for the reception. We all adore this girl; we have watched her grow up in our church, and there was no way everyone was missing out on celebrating her big day just because she couldn't afford to feed us.

 

The bride included a note in the invitations that were addresed to the church members that the reception would be a potluck and to let the groom's mother know what you were planning on bringing if you chose to help out this way. She kept track of who was bringing what; this way they could be sure they wouldn't have 18 salads and no main dishes, and also that there would be enough food. Family members who had to travel to attend the wedding and casual friends were not asked to bring a dish.

 

Several ladies from our church volunteered to serve in the kitchen at the reception hall, so no one had to leave deviled eggs out all afternoon or make a detour across town to pick up their dish before the reception. The food was kept hot/cold until it was time to serve. The kitchen opened two hours prior to the wedding so people could drop off their food whenever it was convenient for them before the wedding.

 

There was plenty of food; in fact, there was more than enough. There were almost two refrigerators full of leftovers at the end of the evening. No one spent a burdensome amount of money, and no one spent anywhere near what it would have cost the couple to have fed their family - I think I spent about $8 on my dish, and it would have cost them $100 to feed us. The gift table was overflowing, and knowing the guests like I do, no one deducted the cost of the dish they prepared from the gift they gave the couple - both were separate gifts, given out of love.

 

The wedding was lovely, the reception was a blast, and the only comments I overheard about the food at the reception were positive - no one there thought the potluck buffet was tacky. I think they all secretly appreciated not having to eat dry chicken and rice pilaf. :D

That sounds lovely.

 

I'm jealous because I bet there was a lot of super yummy food.

[TechWife]

I think when you invite someone to an event that you are hosting, you shouldn't expect them to "pay their own way" by providing food or entertainment. A guest is just that. 

[JumpyTheFrog]

I think when you invite someone to an event that you are hosting, you shouldn't expect

to "pay their own way" by providing food or entertainment. A guest is just that.

I generally agree for formal occasions, although I think it's fine to ask close family and friends to bring food for Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner (if they live nearby). For informal cookouts and church dinners, potlucks are great. I'm not a formal person at all (neither is DH) but we still both consider weddings to be the most formal party most people will ever throw and that the hosts should, well, host.

 

I never advocate people going into debt and I think spending even $10,000 is a lot, but it's possibly to have something nice for much less than that.

 

I think the wedding my mom liked best was one held near Halloween. They asked the guests to wear costumes if they wanted. It sounds like a great excuse to buy an expensive princess dress or something. Although the theme was informal, they were still served dinner, plus given glowsticks.

[poppy]

Ok, let me explain; maybe I can answer some of the questions in this thread (not just yours, marbel).

 

The potluck idea for the wedding I attended yesterday came from a conversation among several ladies in our church, myself included. The bride was upset because the couple could not afford to pay $4000 for catering ($20/person), so it looked like the couple was going to have to cut their guest list by 75% in order to be able to pay for catering at the reception. That 75% included everyone from our church, as well as their friends and co-workers. She felt that she really needed to provide a meal at the reception, but she thought it would be rude to have a reception that only family members could attend, so the only solution she could see would be to just invite family to the wedding. We told her that if she made it a potluck, she could count on her church family to provide the food for the reception. We all adore this girl; we have watched her grow up in our church, and there was no way everyone was missing out on celebrating her big day just because she couldn't afford to feed us.

 

The bride included a note in the invitations that were addresed to the church members that the reception would be a potluck and to let the groom's mother know what you were planning on bringing if you chose to help out this way. She kept track of who was bringing what; this way they could be sure they wouldn't have 18 salads and no main dishes, and also that there would be enough food. Family members who had to travel to attend the wedding and casual friends were not asked to bring a dish.

 

Several ladies from our church volunteered to serve in the kitchen at the reception hall, so no one had to leave deviled eggs out all afternoon or make a detour across town to pick up their dish before the reception. The food was kept hot/cold until it was time to serve. The kitchen opened two hours prior to the wedding so people could drop off their food whenever it was convenient for them before the wedding.

 

There was plenty of food; in fact, there was more than enough. There were almost two refrigerators full of leftovers at the end of the evening. No one spent a burdensome amount of money, and no one spent anywhere near what it would have cost the couple to have fed their family - I think I spent about $8 on my dish, and it would have cost them $100 to feed us. The gift table was overflowing, and knowing the guests like I do, no one deducted the cost of the dish they prepared from the gift they gave the couple - both were separate gifts, given out of love.

 

The wedding was lovely, the reception was a blast, and the only comments I overheard about the food at the reception were positive - no one there thought the potluck buffet was tacky. I think they all secretly appreciated not having to eat dry chicken and rice pilaf. :D

I am guessing the community would have rallied around her and had a lovely time even if she hadn't insisted on serving a meal.

 

If I was on invited to a wedding like that - I would cook, and buy a gift (without deducting my food costs, obviously ), and attend, and wish them well, and I'd certainly not complain about it to people in church. But is most definitely have wished they'd just had a simple ceremony and cake & pinch or cheese & crackers instead of putting me out. I imagine that reaction is not uncommon, given the number of people in this thread who voted they don't like potluck weddings.

[mommaduck]

Ok, let me explain; maybe I can answer some of the questions in this thread (not just yours, marbel).

 

The potluck idea for the wedding I attended yesterday came from a conversation among several ladies in our church, myself included. The bride was upset because the couple could not afford to pay $4000 for catering ($20/person), so it looked like the couple was going to have to cut their guest list by 75% in order to be able to pay for catering at the reception. That 75% included everyone from our church, as well as their friends and co-workers. She felt that she really needed to provide a meal at the reception, but she thought it would be rude to have a reception that only family members could attend, so the only solution she could see would be to just invite family to the wedding. We told her that if she made it a potluck, she could count on her church family to provide the food for the reception. We all adore this girl; we have watched her grow up in our church, and there was no way everyone was missing out on celebrating her big day just because she couldn't afford to feed us.

 

The bride included a note in the invitations that were addresed to the church members that the reception would be a potluck and to let the groom's mother know what you were planning on bringing if you chose to help out this way. She kept track of who was bringing what; this way they could be sure they wouldn't have 18 salads and no main dishes, and also that there would be enough food. Family members who had to travel to attend the wedding and casual friends were not asked to bring a dish.

 

Several ladies from our church volunteered to serve in the kitchen at the reception hall, so no one had to leave deviled eggs out all afternoon or make a detour across town to pick up their dish before the reception. The food was kept hot/cold until it was time to serve. The kitchen opened two hours prior to the wedding so people could drop off their food whenever it was convenient for them before the wedding.

 

There was plenty of food; in fact, there was more than enough. There were almost two refrigerators full of leftovers at the end of the evening. No one spent a burdensome amount of money, and no one spent anywhere near what it would have cost the couple to have fed their family - I think I spent about $8 on my dish, and it would have cost them $100 to feed us. The gift table was overflowing, and knowing the guests like I do, no one deducted the cost of the dish they prepared from the gift they gave the couple - both were separate gifts, given out of love.

 

The wedding was lovely, the reception was a blast, and the only comments I overheard about the food at the reception were positive - no one there thought the potluck buffet was tacky. I think they all secretly appreciated not having to eat dry chicken and rice pilaf. :D

 

And this is what we call COMMUNITY. Community celebrating a couple's marriage. <3

[Orthodox6]

A wedding is a wedding.

A party is a party.

The former does not dictate the latter.

 

Select a realistic budget.  Refuse to "show off" or "perform" at some expected level.  If money is scarce, be grateful for what IS available in life! 

 

The wedding is what matters.  Anything afterward is "dessert", and dessert is optional.

[Gentlemommy]

Meh. Weddings, IMO, are way too often blown out of proportion the other way. Massive amounts of money blown on one day.

 

I'd rather see a potluck or backyard BBQ, actually. With more focus on the marriage and lifelong commitment and less on the wedding day.

YES. This is exactly how I feel.

[catz]

Ok, let me explain; maybe I can answer some of the questions in this thread (not just yours, marbel).

 

The potluck idea for the wedding I attended yesterday came from a conversation among several ladies in our church, myself included. The bride was upset because the couple could not afford to pay $4000 for catering ($20/person), so it looked like the couple was going to have to cut their guest list by 75% in order to be able to pay for catering at the reception. That 75% included everyone from our church, as well as their friends and co-workers. She felt that she really needed to provide a meal at the reception, but she thought it would be rude to have a reception that only family members could attend, so the only solution she could see would be to just invite family to the wedding. We told her that if she made it a potluck, she could count on her church family to provide the food for the reception. We all adore this girl; we have watched her grow up in our church, and there was no way everyone was missing out on celebrating her big day just because she couldn't afford to feed us.

 

The bride included a note in the invitations that were addresed to the church members that the reception would be a potluck and to let the groom's mother know what you were planning on bringing if you chose to help out this way. She kept track of who was bringing what; this way they could be sure they wouldn't have 18 salads and no main dishes, and also that there would be enough food. Family members who had to travel to attend the wedding and casual friends were not asked to bring a dish.

 

Several ladies from our church volunteered to serve in the kitchen at the reception hall, so no one had to leave deviled eggs out all afternoon or make a detour across town to pick up their dish before the reception. The food was kept hot/cold until it was time to serve. The kitchen opened two hours prior to the wedding so people could drop off their food whenever it was convenient for them before the wedding.

 

There was plenty of food; in fact, there was more than enough. There were almost two refrigerators full of leftovers at the end of the evening. No one spent a burdensome amount of money, and no one spent anywhere near what it would have cost the couple to have fed their family - I think I spent about $8 on my dish, and it would have cost them $100 to feed us. The gift table was overflowing, and knowing the guests like I do, no one deducted the cost of the dish they prepared from the gift they gave the couple - both were separate gifts, given out of love.

 

The wedding was lovely, the reception was a blast, and the only comments I overheard about the food at the reception were positive - no one there thought the potluck buffet was tacky. I think they all secretly appreciated not having to eat dry chicken and rice pilaf. :D

 

I think there's a difference between a group of people volunteering to help and thinking that's a good idea and just throwing out uni-lateral written invites to far flung people that are going to need to pay for accommodations, other meals over that weekend, and possibly new clothing.  If you know Aunt Suzie well enough to ask her to make her spinach quiche and she's a foodie, then that is great and it's part of your family and community culture.  If your mom or MIL is horrified by this idea, it's probably not for your family. I also think gifts/registering should be downplayed at events like this.  Many will bring a gift anyway.  I do think there is a point where the logistics for something like this for more than 50 or so could start to get very complex in terms of keeping stuff warm or cool and food safety.

 

I also think there's absolutely nothing wrong with going to a court house with a couple witnesses or having a simple church ceremony and then cake and punch or dinner for immediate family.  I never feel slighted if I don't get an invite to someone's wedding. 

 

Maybe I'm weird, but when I cook for a potluck it is not unusual to drop an extra $30-50+ on groceries to make a large mixed fruit tray, high end dessert, or some fancy appetizers.  So maybe that just depends how you shop and cook and where you live, but that would not be unusual for me at all.  Where we are, we go to some amazing potlucks with meticulously made high end food.  I have some friends that could easily cater a small event (and I could too and have).  But my ILs family has some horrible potlucks with highly processed, pre-made ick food.  So honestly, I'd rather go to a very simple cake and punch event than potluck option #2.  I think you have to know your invite list extremely well.  I would probably not be inviting casual acquaintances to a potluck reception.

 

[marbel]

Ok, let me explain; maybe I can answer some of the questions in this thread (not just yours, marbel).

 

<snipped for brevity>

 

That does sound very nice.  If I was a member of that church I would probably be a bit more enthusiastic about it than I have been about other potluck weddings I've been invited to/attended.  But that sounds like a true church family, where the people are close and, well, like family, not just people who happen to happen to  go to the same church but have no real relationship.   

 

ETA:  Thinking about this some more... I wonder if it wouldn't have been more helpful to her, in the long run, if some of the women in the congregation (and her own mother?) would have helped her come to see that she could indeed have had a fine wedding and reception without serving a meal.   That might not have been the wedding of her dreams but a nice object lesson on living within one's means, kwim?   I wonder why she was so stuck on the need for a meal - cultural expectation, maybe?  (You don't have to answer, I'm just musing.)    Just thinking how I'd like a similar scenario to work out for my own daughter.

 

Either way works, and I'm glad everyone had a good time. 

[QueenCat]

Not usually during the reception itself, but it's pretty typical to open them Sunday morning...

 

I have seen that but it has been more informal, with more verbal invitations to very close family plus those that have traveled far and are still in town. Maybe 15-20 people, with a simple brunch.

[Myeightkiddies]

Weddings are ridiculously expensive events that really only benefit the businesses tied to them.  I'm all for pot luck weddings. I haven't had one or been to one, but I would have no issue going and bringing something.  It should be about the couple.  The couple could greatly benefit from the money saved.  Besides the food is probably better at the potluck than most any caterer (at least in my experience).  Celebrate the couple and save them some money.

[Crimson Wife]

Wow, so a wedding of 200 would cost $20,000+ just for the food!  Our prices are nowhere near that around here.

 

Yep. We had our reception in 2000 and most of the venues were charging $50+/guest even back then (the Boston metro area is super-expensive). I just looked up what one of the places we considered charges now and it's $150-$175 [insert fainting smiley here]

 

[Dory]

My brother and his wife had cold cuts, sandwiches, and salads that the family made. I think their entire wedding cost under the 10,000. That wasn't in Canada either. The wedding was in Montana.

[chocolatechip]

A wedding is a wedding.

A party is a party.

The former does not dictate the latter.

 

Select a realistic budget.  Refuse to "show off" or "perform" at some expected level.  If money is scarce, be grateful for what IS available in life! 

 

The wedding is what matters.  Anything afterward is "dessert", and dessert is optional.

This.

 

IMHO, way too much focus is put on the wedding -a SINGLE day- rather than the marriage, which is the part that really matters. (Disclaimer: this is not something I have personal experience in, since I'm not married. I only speak from what I have observed at weddings I've attended.) If the wedding was really all there was to marriage, it seems that would be mighty depressing! 

 

I also feel that people often bring unpleasantly entitled attitudes to weddings. It's not about you. It's not about you doing the couple a favor by deigning to bestow your illustrious presence on them for the space of over an hour. (Gasp!) Or your supreme benevolence in bringing a lavish and extravagant gift. Or whatever. 

 

If someone invites me to a wedding, I'm just happy they invited me to share in their special day. If I go, it should be because I'm happy for the couple and want to help them celebrate the occasion. If I bring a gift, it should be because I love the couple and genuinely want to give something to help them set up their home and new life together. 

 

Generally, I think chilling a little and just being gracious goes a long way. 

[Audrey]

I fail to see how potluck weddings are any more or less tacky than destination weddings, or any other kind of weddings for that matter.

 

 

[Jenny in Florida]

If I was on invited to a wedding like that - I would cook, and buy a gift (without deducting my food costs, obviously ), and attend, and wish them well, and I'd certainly not complain about it to people in church. But is most definitely have wished they'd just had a simple ceremony and cake & pinch or cheese & crackers instead of putting me out. 

 

Whereas I would be thrilled and honored that I had been invited to help create a lovely celebration for this couple and the community. I would not feel put out in the slightest, but happy I could contribute.

[LucyStoner]

Couples can't really win here. If there is not a meal and people have travelled to the wedding, invariably a bunch of people find that tacky or rude.

[Slartibartfast]

I like potlucks.

 

I wouldn't care if someone had a potluck wedding. I don't get annoyed about things that don't matter, ain't nobody got time for that!

[catz]

Couples can't really win here. If there is not a meal and people have traveled to the wedding, invariably a bunch of people find that tacky or rude.

 

Ultimately, you need to know your guest list.  If you want 100-200+ and will be inviting people like your dad's coworkers and distant relatives you haven't seen personally in years, paying for a venue, having a band, etc. pot luck is not the way to go.  If you're having 25-50 of your nearest and dearest locals at a park or a church community setting where potlucks are the norm, your closest family and friends buy into that idea, and you aren't budgeting for other high end things for the wedding or honeymoon, I think it's probably fine.  Same thing for destination weddings where there is a guest list involved.  Do you take vacation with family?  Are they adventurous?  Do they have a disposable income?  Eloping is totally fine too!

 

I do think it's rude to ask someone to pay for accommodations for the weekend and produce food for your wedding.  You could recruit a small group of your foodie locals to do your food as an option, or not ask out of towners to bring anything.  Courthouse wedding is always an option too.  Just because you CAN spend $100/head for a wedding doesn't mean there's quite a range of choices between asking out of town guests to bring food and that $100/head high end venue.  We have plenty of high end venues in my city.  I am urban, my wedding was midsize, and I did have a catered meal in a historic hotel that was not cheap.  But I've also been to quite a few elegant smaller weddings that didn't have a meal at all and had an outdoor or simple venue that probably cost a fraction of what my wedding did and were still absolutely beautiful.  I've been to church basement weddings with sandwich trays from the grocery store and a costco cake.  I've also been very happy to get wedding announcements after the fact.  If a couple wants to get married, it's possible on a shoestring. 

[Carol in Cal.]

 

 

The potluck idea for the wedding I attended yesterday came from a conversation among several ladies in our church, myself included. The bride was upset because the couple could not afford to pay $4000 for catering ($20/person), so it looked like the couple was going to have to cut their guest list by 75% in order to be able to pay for catering at the reception. That 75% included everyone from our church, as well as their friends and co-workers. She felt that she really needed to provide a meal at the reception, but she thought it would be rude to have a reception that only family members could attend, so the only solution she could see would be to just invite family to the wedding. We told her that if she made it a potluck, she could count on her church family to provide the food for the reception. We all adore this girl; we have watched her grow up in our church, and there was no way everyone was missing out on celebrating her big day just because she couldn't afford to feed us.

 

 

What redeems that for me is that people offered.

I would still not have put it into the invitation, though.

Instead I would have asked those who offered to coordinate the potluck part of it, and avoided being blatantly overlapped with a meal time in case there was not enough food.

 

In similar circumstances people I know had cake and punch and coffee in the church basement, and then those who were invited to the reception headed out to it, which is where the dancing and sit down dinner were served.  That was a graceful way to handle the fact that the bride and groom were organists at two churches, and everyone wanted to see the actual wedding at the church, so they still hosted there a bit, but then did not have such a huge reception.

[Lady Florida.]

Not tacky. 

 

I've never understood why people have rules about something like a wedding...  

It's a joyful celebration where a couple invites their friends and family to celebrate with them.  So long as they aren't being blatantly rude, demanding, etc., I tend to think the couple gets to set the rules for their celebration.  

 

Potluck?

I'll bring my broccoli raisin stuff.   :)

 

This. As a PP said, it's not about the guests. I've only been to one potluck (I prefer the term covered dish) wedding and it was lovely. There was nothing tacky about it. The couple was grateful and the guests were happy to bring food to share for the couple's special day. If anyone thought it was tacky, they either kept their mouths shut (the truly polite thing to do) or they stayed home. Either way, dh and I were unaware of any controversy. If the bride and groom had to deal with it, I'm sorry for them but at least people had the courtesy to not let it affect the reception itself.

 

 

Of course, I grew up in a time and place where most couples didn't have big receptions, and often marriages were performed privately, with just the couple and the minister and the required number of witnesses. And when I got married, most of us had receptions at the church, with cake and punch and pastel-colored mints, definitely NOT a sit-down meal.

 

Place perhaps, but time? We are of a similar age you and I - I'm possibly a year or two older. Where I came from (similar time as you, different place and possibly a different culture) weddings were big affairs. I grew up in an Irish-Italian family so this might have been a Catholic thing. The weddings were big as were receptions. Wedding receptions were formal, included a sit down dinner, full open bar, and a live band. Have you seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding? The weddings of my time and place were like that only Italian. When I got married in Florida we had a buffet style meal (with paper plates oh my!), a DJ who happened to be a coworker, and an open bar but with only wine and beer plus the obligatory champagne. It took some work to convince my Italian aunts from NJ that this was a perfectly acceptable wedding reception in our location.

[Maeve]

I'm a Quaker and our tradition is to have a potluck wedding (has someone already said this??  I just joined and haven't read all the replies).  One way to explain it is that potluck is the Quaker form of communion - it is breaking bread with your community.  In a Quaker wedding, it is the community that marries the bride and groom, affirming this by signing the marraige certificate.  When I got married, we had mostly non-Quaker guests coming from out of town so we didn't do a full potluck.  I've been to plenty of Quaker weddings that were potluck, and we did potluck at my first wedding.  However, to honor the Quaker testimony of simplicity, I catered the wedding myself and hired some of my students to be the wait staff (college students...I did nothing during the wedding itself except assure them they were doing a good job).  We did a potluck dessert, which was awesome - quite the spread.  It was a great wedding...New Years Eve party, with a jazz band, plenty of dancing.  Part of what we did was explain in our invitations the tradition of potluck in my faith.

[Jenny in Florida]

One way to explain it is that potluck is the Quaker form of communion - it is breaking bread with your community.  In a Quaker wedding, it is the community that marries the bride and groom, affirming this by signing the marraige certificate.  

 

I am not a Quaker, but this is exactly the sentiment I've been trying to express. A potluck wedding to me sounds lovely precisely because it gives the community a chance to participate, to come together and break bread and celebrate the event. Thank you for sharing this!

[LucyStoner]

Ultimately, you need to know your guest list. If you want 100-200+ and will be inviting people like your dad's coworkers and distant relatives you haven't seen personally in years, paying for a venue, having a band, etc. pot luck is not the way to go. If you're having 25-50 of your nearest and dearest locals at a park or a church community setting where potlucks are the norm, your closest family and friends buy into that idea, and you aren't budgeting for other high end things for the wedding or honeymoon, I think it's probably fine. Same thing for destination weddings where there is a guest list involved. Do you take vacation with family? Are they adventurous? Do they have a disposable income? Eloping is totally fine too!

 

I do think it's rude to ask someone to pay for accommodations for the weekend and produce food for your wedding. You could recruit a small group of your foodie locals to do your food as an option, or not ask out of towners to bring anything. Courthouse wedding is always an option too. Just because you CAN spend $100/head for a wedding doesn't mean there's quite a range of choices between asking out of town guests to bring food and that $100/head high end venue. We have plenty of high end venues in my city. I am urban, my wedding was midsize, and I did have a catered meal in a historic hotel that was not cheap. But I've also been to quite a few elegant smaller weddings that didn't have a meal at all and had an outdoor or simple venue that probably cost a fraction of what my wedding did and were still absolutely beautiful. I've been to church basement weddings with sandwich trays from the grocery store and a costco cake. I've also been very happy to get wedding announcements after the fact. If a couple wants to get married, it's possible on a shoestring.

I agree that you need to know your crowd. I will admit though that I don't usually attend any weddings except for my dearest friends and close family. We decline and send a gift to distant cousins, co-workers, children of people from church etc. Not because we hate them but because if we attended every wedding that is all we'd be doing all summer. Most of my friends lean towards the "save the money for the house" side of things. I think one friend did do a potluck, I've cooked for a couple of friends (much like my own wedding- the best man and my brother's boyfriend helped us cook) and one of my old teachers had a potluck reception for their second wedding. Mostly it's inexpensive catering options.

 

We had a shoestring wedding ourselves. My parents don't have money and we weren't going to take money from his parents so we paid for it ourselves. We self catered a brunch and rented a beautiful Victorian home that is the HQs for a garden club in the way off season. We didn't consider a potluck because we were really into the whole brunch idea. We did baked eggs, roasted potatoes/veggies, granola, muffins. For the cake we had little cheesecake cups with a chocolate and fruit topping. It was all mostly make ahead stuff and we heated the veg and baked the eggs during the ceremony. Many of the people had no idea we hadn't hired someone until people asked us who did the food. Almost 1/2 of our guests were from out of town, many driving, and I wasn't going to have them show up for cake and punch. We like food too much not to eat at our own wedding anyways. And my Catholic family definitely likes to eat at weddings. I figured marrying a non-Catholic was enough of a blow to my grandparents. If I didn't serve food at the wedding, that might have done my grandma in.

[Momto4inSoCal]

I've never been to a potluck wedding but I wouldn't mind going to one especially if it was family. I'd rather them be able to have their family and friends there to celebrate and get their moment than have to miss it because they can't afford to feed everyone. My cousin got married at a courthouse and we all met at a restaurant to eat and celebrate after. We all paid for our own food and none of us minded. He had been through a lot to get to where he was and we were so proud of him and just happy to be there. 

[Laura Corin]

I try to see past any 'rules' to the spirit of the occasion.  What is the best way for this particular couple to bring family and friends together to celebrate their wedding?  If someone doesn't feel 'brought together' by potluck, then probably they should keep their disapproval at home with them and send a polite card.  I would hope that people of good will would not feel the need to do this, however.

 

L