How much drink do you expect at a wedding?

Not at all, that is more than enough.

We have a drinks package and ours consist of, glass of bubbly on arrival, couple of glasses of wine during meal and one glass of bubbly for the toast. We are not putting on a free bar, but the bar will be open during the reception and evening for guests to buy themselves a drink when they want.

Your packages sound similar to our hotel's standard offering so I guess that's a fairly standard indication of what generally works best.

We've arranged a non alcoholic package of drinks with the hotel for our day (it suits us and the majority of our guests - let's not get another argument about alcohol going) but there is a private bar in a side room off of the function room that will be open from the start of the wedding breakfast till midnight for people that want to buy alcoholic drinks.

I think that is very generous.

We won't be providing any alcohol whatsoever at our wedding, instead the bar will be open from arrival all night unti departure.

We have 150 day guests and so I'd rather them buy their own than we provide them with some cheap and bad quality drinks that they don't want.

That is very similar to what we are having & also to most of the weddings that I have been to over the last couple of years. People don't generally expect you to pay for an endless free drinking sess now as weddings are just too big & it gets prohibitively expensive. With my OH's RAF mates they can drink for britain & to provide free booze for them all night would literally cost thousands!

We have the same package.. I think thats fine not everyone drinks and some want different drinks so they can buy their own!!

Thanks guys, I have a friend who is having a free bar at her wedding and you know how it is you start to think too much about your own wedding and question things!!

Our package is almost identical to yours with the exception of having the choice of whisky, vodka, rum or gin after their champagne on arrival which i think is plenty. My dad had left money with my mum just before he died and told her that everyone including our evening guests had to have a drink on him to celebrate his daughters wedding, so i think our guests will be pretty well plastered before they have to put their hands in their pockets and buy their own.

I have a vague recollection of someone here posting a while ago about budgetting £2000 to put "behind the bar" for free drinks all night, and it was gone in about an hour.

What a lovely thing for him to have done. x

@ Kayl - Im the same - I think were on the same wavelength about a lot of things!

Because the minister etc is attending our wedding reception & around 60 / 70% of guests dont drink were not providing any alcoholic beverages but the bar will be open for anyone who wants to purchase their own. Our minister is quite straight laced & I wouldnt want to offend him, hes a lovely man who has been very kindly & helpful o us. I would rather ensure everyone gets a fantastic meal ( as all our guests eat) as opposed to a lesser meal & alcohol for the smaller percentage of guests.

We had an unlimited drinks package. From the moment of our guest's arrival to the end of the wedding breakfast they were able to have unlimited champagne, Pimms, a non alcoholic cocktail, lager or wine/ soft drinks. We gave our evening guests free welcome drinks and then we had a cash bar.

This worked out really well.

I wouldn't expect anything from a wedding accept an actual wedding, lol.

We're having a very basic drinks package too, after ceremony drink, wine on the tables during the meal, something sparkly for the toast and tea and coffee after.

The bar will be open all day so if people don't like/want what we're offering their able to buy their own.

I would have loved to have had a free bar or even a couple of grand for the guests but we just didn't have the budget.

We are having a glass of bubbly on arrival, a glass of wine with each course, and champagne to toast, I also questioned if it was enough but to be honest we havnt got an endless supply of money so its going to have to be ok, I've been to a few weddings this year where the package was similar to ours and it was recieved fine.

That's good to know SaSaSi, at least I know I am not being totally rude to my guests if you agree.

The last celebration I went to was organised by a very proud Italian who threw a 30th bash for his boyfriend at the Hilton, spending hundreds (nearly thousands) on champagne on arrival.

By 9pm it was still there fizzing out.... I guess it depends on the kind of people you have attending? Me and my friends regularly sip champagne all night on an average night out, and so it is not a novelty to me, and that will be my choice of drink all night so there will be a bottle of quality champagne on the top table.

However for many of my guests if they have it then it would be a "one off" which they clearly won't appreciate fully as once the free stuff is gone they will soon return to their lager / house wine combo. I'm not being rude to my guests by any means, they would all agree with this!

I know that is quite contraversal, but also, our wedding is mainly famiy (all 150 of them!!) and I know they would rather me and OH had an extra £1,000 to spend on honeymoon than they be forced to down "cheap" (£6 a glass) champagne.

Trickers - I am always very defensive (sorry! it's my nature...)

ETA: And probably seeking reassurance I haven't messed up while I can still change it! I am the first one of all of our friends to get wed, and so I have no idea what to do! Thank god for hitched!

Your drinks package is almost identical to ours - I think it's pretty much standard for weddings. I'm always happy to have any free drink!

I think this package is the norm at most weddings and should be plenty. Especially as not everyone will be drinking.

Sounds more than enough, OH & Myself are not big drinkers at all so probably wouldn't drink a lot of it. My limit is one glass of Champagne & a glass of wine & I am ready for bed!

@ Kayl - I dont think its rude at all!

We finally got a guest list sorted & are inviting 160 to our wedding reception and a further 200 to our evening (how many comes reminds to be seen) and what the drinks package would be would cover a really great evening buffet so thats our choice and any of our guests who weve mentioned it to have no problems with it - Ive told our friends to book a room asap & request to be near reception so they can have sneaky drinks in their room

Your package sounds reasonable. I'd expect a glass of bubbly for toasts as a minimum, anything else is a bonus. But I don't actually LIKE champagne, so I'm going to ask for alternatives to bubbly too for our wedding.

I think there is a lot of competition with weddings, and the minute one person has a free bar (or whatever) everyone else thinks they have to too. It's a shame, because there are also a lot of people thinking they're missing out because they can't afford all the bells and whistles.