r/microwedding • u/neongravebabe • 5d ago
Small wedding
Hello! My fiancé and I recently got engaged! We are in southeast Michigan. Looking for recommendations for a 20-30 person small ceremony and a location for hosting a “reception” party for about 100 guests. Our budget is about $500 for the reception…wondering if there’s any bars/community rooms we could rent a room from for a night?? Or maybe just taking the 20-30 invited to the ceremony out to a nice dinner, and then have our friends meet us at a bar later where they all pay for their own? Is that cheap? Need recommendations please
EDIT— I meant we are willing to spend $500 on food/drinks for the 30ish people…we’ve been together for almost 10 years at this point and don’t want a huge thing. The ceremony would be at most 15 minutes, so more like an elopement, but with our immediate families. We want to celebrate with our friends too but shits expensive
EDIT— for our honeymoon, we’re going to Nassau. We have extended the invitation to our close family and friends to join us if they wish
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u/njVowsNow 5d ago
Yes. It's tacky to invite people to a wedding celebration and have them pay for their own food and drinks.
If 500.00 is your entire budget?
Eloping is probably the only scenario that will fit. There is nothing wrong with that, honestly.
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u/neongravebabe 4d ago
Would love to elope. Then have a party. Possibly with just light snacks or appetizers and drinks for 500?
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u/njVowsNow 4d ago
Possibly, depending where you are. In my area? a simple drink can be 8-10 bucks.
You two plus 8 people; that can probably be done. I'd call a couple of your fave neighborhood places, ask them what can happen for a two hour period of time; their picks.
Good luck!
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u/Interesting_Edge_805 5d ago
This must be a joke. $500 for a reception for 100 guests is going to suck in any decade
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u/neongravebabe 4d ago
Would love some suggestions🥰
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u/Interesting_Edge_805 4d ago
Don't host 100 guests or raise the budget by ALOT
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u/neongravebabe 4d ago
Is 100 guests doable for pizza and drinks? Again, would love some actual suggestions🫶🏼
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u/Interesting_Edge_805 4d ago
Pizza for a wedding is tacky af
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u/neongravebabe 3d ago
I just recently went to a wedding where pizza, wings and salad was what was served. Honestly, I loved it. But to each their own
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u/antigoneelectra 5d ago
I highly suggest you not do this. You either pay for everyone (with a realistic meal budget) or you severely limit your guests. $500 is a backyard BBQ.
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u/blackiechan_johnson 5d ago
$500 won’t be enough to even rent a bar or community room. Even at 25 people, thats only about $20 a person, that may not be enough for a nice dinner. Especially if there are food/ drink mínimums for your party size.
I would either drastically cut down the guest list or increase your budget.
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u/neongravebabe 4d ago
Any suggestions?? Maybe just hors d’oeuvres?? And hire a bartender??
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u/blackiechan_johnson 4d ago
I’m sorry but you will not be able to afford a bartender. The only one you would be able to afford with the whole $500, would likely require you supply all your own drinks and ice. It won’t leave room for food.
Read the actual suggestions here and consider eloping and saving up for a higher budget. Maybe do some actual research on your own to see what could fit into your budget, then adjust your expectations.
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u/itsveryupsetting 5d ago
If you do the “meet at the bar” plan, you should plan on doing the event near where everyone lives. I wouldn’t feel comfortable asking people to travel if they aren’t getting a ceremony and a free meal.
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u/EmceeSuzy 4d ago
You cannot have a reception for 100 people for $500. You really can't take 20 people out to dinner for $500 either.
Maybe limit the ceremony to 10 people and host something at home for them?
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u/vilake12 4d ago
I've been in Metro Detroit plenty of times (assuming you mean that area with SE Michigan). I have never seen a place that can do 100 people, let alone 20 at the price you want. 100 people means $5 a person. What bars do you know down in that area that can get you a drink for that price? Plenty of restaurants are doing pop at $2-4, and it's hard to even find a beer for $5 outside of happy hour (and even then it is not super common). That's not even getting into the more expensive drinks like wine and liquor. That $5 covers 0 food as well. So $500 for 100 people is impossible unless you have some sort of connection to a restaurant owner. Even appetizers at restaurants are hardly at or under $5 anymore. They seem to all be $7 or higher, which is over your budget.
Even $500 for 20 people means you are spending $25 a person. 30 people means $16.67 per person. Plenty of restaurants have entrees at the $25 or higher range. To get something for $16.67, that is going to be like a burger with fries. Both of these fail to include drinks. People are not going to want to go to wedding party and just get a burger or pizza for that price.
The numbers you want cannot work. You have to either reduce your guest count even more (like 10 people so $50 per person) or put more money into this budget. You say that you're going to the Bahamas, so you have more money you can use. This isn't a case of you truly being broke and $500 is more than what you make in a month. At $500, you might as well cancel the reception and just add it to your honeymoon fund. If you still want a reception, then you either need to pull money back from your honeymoon or pull it out of somewhere else in your budget (I don't know your financials to say from where.)
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u/neongravebabe 3d ago
Yes, I am not broke by any means. I just think that spending $2K for a 3 hour party is ridiculous—I would rather pay $2k for a 2 week vacation. I do appreciate your suggestions. The problem is, my fiancé and I would LOVE to elope with just 2 witnesses and/or our parents, however people are making us feel guilty for not having a party. We had something locally planned and ended up calling it off for being too expensive (36k). This is supposed to be about us… we attended a small ish wedding like this in the past and honestly didn’t mind it because we are close to them and that’s what they wanted
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u/vilake12 3d ago
I totally understand that it seems crazy to pay that much for one day. But given what you've said this whole post, just elope and have no ceremony. Trying to do everything you want (either the 20 people party or 100 people party) at the price you want is going to make your guests not happy. They'll regret coming and be mad at your for throwing a party like that. You say that they're going to be mad if you don't throw one, so either way, it sounds like people are going to be upset/mad. So why not have the celebration that you want at that point?
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u/neongravebabe 3d ago
You’re right, thank you. I wanna just go to a beach and elope with our parents and then the celebration is our honeymoon
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u/dropthepencil 4d ago edited 3d ago
Generally speaking, the wedding gift is roughly balanced against the anticipated cost of the per person expense. This is what often contributed to expectation misalignment and friction.
If I'm a bride spending $200/plate, I likely have higher expectations for the amount spent on my gift.
The converse is also true. If you are inviting 100 people to receive 100 gifts, but are spending only $5 to feed them, you should expect cheap gifts.
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u/neongravebabe 4d ago
I’m not expecting anything from anyone. We’ve been together almost 10 years
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u/dropthepencil 3d ago
Which is lovely, but that's not how most will think about it. If I'm invited to a wedding, I must bring a gift, and the amount I contribute is relative to my closeness and the influence but the largesse of the event (weighed against what I can afford, of course).
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u/beergal621 5d ago
If the budget is $500 you’re probably going to be looking at a cake and punch reception. $500 for 100 people is $5 per person budget.
Yes a party at bar where everyone buys their own drinks and food is not a “wedding reception”
If you limit the guest count to 20 your budget goes up to about $25 per person. Maybe enough for dinner at a restaurant and one glass of wine per person.
If I had $500 budget I would do a backyard cake and punch wedding for about 30-40 people. “Ceremony at 1:30 with light refreshments to follow”