Should I invite bosses to shower if they declined wedding?

chica_zarca

I work at a pretty big, close-knit company, and have 11 superiors in the 1-2 levels above mine. I went the "if you invite one, invite them all" approach, which was fine since I personally do like all of them and would've been pleased to have them attend.

However, 4 of them have declined and 1 hasn't answered yet. One who declined sent me a very apologetic email explaining that her cousin is getting married the same day (blood is thicker than water, I totally understood), though the others haven't mentioned anything to me at all yet. It's none of my business of course, but it does leave me a little unsure as to whether I should still have my sister (MOH) invite them to the shower or not...

I don't want the shower invite to come across as "sorry you can't make it, but give me a gift anyway" NOR do I want it to come across as "well if you can't come to one event, you can't celebrate anything else either". I don't want to look gift-grabby, but I don't want to seem snide about it either.

I'm leaning towards leaving them on the shower list anyway, and leaving it up to them if they choose to come, but figured I'd reach out to the community here to get some insight or feedback about whether this is appropriate or not.

Thanks!

princessleia22

Really, anybody that was invited to wedding is open to invite to shower also.  Like you did with wedding invites, if you plan to invite any of them, I would invite them all.  And I wouldn't exclude them just because they aren't able to come to wedding.  If they were still coming to the wedding, would you invite them to shower? If so, then invite them... it shouldn't be dependent on their wedding RSVP. 

Most of the people attending my shower aren't able to come to my wedding (its OOT wedding and we are only getting about 25% attendance).  And I've had some people offer to throw me a shower just because they aren't able to come and want to do something to celebrate it.  So, they may appreciate the shower invite even more since they aren't able to come to wedding.  And an invite certainly isn't a mandate to attend or requirement to buy gifts.

JellyBean52513

If I were in your shoes, I would err on the side of not inviting them to the shower. Think of it this way: you don't invite someone to a shower without inviting them to the wedding, because it comes off as gift-grabby, right? So, since you know these people won't be at your wedding, further inviting them to a gift-giving wedding event might come off the same way. 

Also, showers are typically more intimate events. If, for whatever reason, your bosses are declining the wedding then it stands to reasons that an even more intimate event will get declined too. Of course, you have no idea why they declined (and to ask would be rude), but I wouldn't want to risk rubbing my superiors the wrong way. 

TheGrimReaper

How are you getting RSVPs to your wedding and haven't sent out shower invitations? What is your timeline?

aRachel21

I totally agree with what JellyBean said... that showers are intimate events.  I did not invite anyone from work to the wedding, but if I did, I wouldn't have invited them to the shower. I feel that's an event for closer family members and friends. 

ScoutF

I wouldn't invite any of your bosses to the shower. Like PP's, I think showers should be more intimate. You don't need to invite everyone from the guest list. 

Also, I agree with @TheGrimReaper. How far in advance did you send out your wedding invitations?

TheGrimReaper

ScoutF said:

I wouldn't invite any of your bosses to the shower. Like PP's, I think showers should be more intimate. You don't need to invite everyone from the guest list. 

Also, I agree with @TheGrimReaper. How far in advance did you send out your wedding invitations?

I doubt she'll come back.  It looks like in her time on TK she's posted 3 discussions and never comes back to them and replies again.  One indicated her wedding is May 31, 2014.  If 10/11 of her bosses (WHY SO MANY BOSSES) replied already, that means they've likely been out for weeks.

indianaalum

I would still invite them if you are CLOSE with them as showers are "intimate" events. Ihad a good friend who couldnt attend my wedding due to a conflict of her own family member getting married. I still invited her to everything because I still wanted her to be part of it as much as I could. she appreciated it, too.

Jen4948

I myself would not invite bosses to a shower.  Showers are supposed to be more intimate events than weddings themselves, and depending on what whoever's hosting your shower has in mind, the plans may not be appropriate for people you have professional but not personal relationships with.

cruffino

That's a boatload of bosses. One is enough for me.

No one but family and one very close friend were invited to my bridal luncheon. Like PP's, I think that's a more intimate event.

JellyBean52513

All I keep seeing in this thread is the word "intimate" to describe a shower. What a nice concept, considering that only 2 people out of the 80 invited to my boss's shower this weekend declined. Can't wait to meet them all.

ScoutF

I was invited to a baby shower for a friend. There were over 80 people there from what she told me. Luckily, I had a migraine that day and couldn't make it (seriously).

TheGrimReaper said:

ScoutF said:

I wouldn't invite any of your bosses to the shower. Like PP's, I think showers should be more intimate. You don't need to invite everyone from the guest list. 

Also, I agree with @TheGrimReaper. How far in advance did you send out your wedding invitations?

I doubt she'll come back.  It looks like in her time on TK she's posted 3 discussions and never comes back to them and replies again.  One indicated her wedding is May 31, 2014.  If 10/11 of her bosses (WHY SO MANY BOSSES) replied already, that means they've likely been out for weeks.

Jeez. Wonder how many tiers she might have?

Cookie Pusher

scribe95 said:

I think showers of 50-60-70-80 people are kind of ridiculous. You can't spend any quality time with all of them as the bride. 

My friend had a (co-ed) baby shower with a ridiculous amount of people (probably close to 100). The thing lasted for 5 or 6 hours. I never even got to say hello to my friend or her husband. And this shower was almost entirely family other than 3 or 4 people. The gifts she got filled an entire room.

chica_zarca

Thanks everyone for your input!

Every shower I've been to in the last few years has been a giant blend of family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, old friends of the family, etc. I haven't been to a single one that was purely "intimate". So I'm ok with going that route myself. I did keep it to just the closest of the bunch and in-town people, so my list is sitting at about 40 plus the bridesmaids and mothers. They're almost all friends, since we're both from pretty small families. Between the 2 of us, we only have 7 female relatives.

To clear the record, I actually am quite close with all of my bosses and see most of them outside of work on weekends, at parties, happy hours, etc. (granted, I see some more frequently than others, but I did still want to be fair to all). I've worked there for almost 6 years and have held a variety of positions and responsibilities under each of them at some point or another as I moved through ranks. They're not just some faceless bigshots in corner offices or anything, but people who have been truly involved in my life.

To those who asked, I sent my invites out February 26th and asked for RSVPs by April 1st. My wedding is May 31st. I probably could've made the deadline a little later, but was eager to get a more accurate headcount so I could plan accordingly for party favors, table settings, seating charts, etc. Plus I know we have tons of procrastinator in the bunch and didn't want to give them so long they'd forget entirely. We're still waiting on at least 40 responses, but at least I have time to reach out to them one by one over the next couple weeks. My sister is leaving my bridal shower as a surprise, so I don't know when it will be or anything but I know she's going to do the invites soon which is why I was asking if I should cross them off or anything.

I think I'm leaning towards what nicoann said. If they were coming to the wedding, I'd love to have them at the shower. And if they choose not to come for whatever reason, that's fine. I'd just hate to exclude them unnecessarily.

PS: @TheGrimReaper, I did actually read all of the replies I got back to my discussions :-) Sorry I didn't comment back; I had kept planning to do it later and time just got away from me, next thing I knew, it just didn't seem worth bumping the thread again. (I haven't logged into TheKnot all that often unfortunately).

SP29

I prefer a more intimate shower, but if you are going to have a larger shower and these bosses are friends of yours, then I would invite them regardless of their RSVP status. If they are friends, treat them as friends. It is then up to them if they want to attend or not. 

TheGrimReaper

It was a trap! I knew if I said you never come back to discussions that you'd come back to this one. And it worked! Glad you did.

And yeah, your invites and RSVP date are WAY WAY too early. 

aleighc3

aRachel21 said:

I totally agree with what JellyBean said... that showers are intimate events.  I did not invite anyone from work to the wedding, but if I did, I wouldn't have invited them to the shower. I feel that's an event for closer family members and friends. 

Just my opinion, but it would be rude to NOT invite them to the shower if they were invited to your wedding. And also, yeah I don't get how you timeline is...

huskypuppy14

aleighc3 said:

aRachel21 said:

I totally agree with what JellyBean said... that showers are intimate events.  I did not invite anyone from work to the wedding, but if I did, I wouldn't have invited them to the shower. I feel that's an event for closer family members and friends. 

Just my opinion, but it would be rude to NOT invite them to the shower if they were invited to your wedding. And also, yeah I don't get how you timeline is...

No, not everyone that is invited to the wedding needs to be invited the shower. Come on, some people invite 300 people to their wedding, so say 1/2 are women, they are going to have 150 people at their shower?  

Also, the bride doesn't plan her own shower, so she can only invite as many people as the hostess is able to host. 

KGold80

aRachel21 said:

I totally agree with what JellyBean said... that showers are intimate events.  I did not invite anyone from work to the wedding, but if I did, I wouldn't have invited them to the shower. I feel that's an event for closer family members and friends. 

aleighc3 said:

Just my opinion, but it would be rude to NOT invite them to the shower if they were invited to your wedding. And also, yeah I don't get how you timeline is...

STUCK IN BOX:

So in your opinion all females who are invited to the wedding should also be invited to the shower? I couldn't disagree more. There are many females we are inviting to the wedding, but that I am not close enough with to request that they be invited to my shower. A shower is traditionally a more intimate event.

chica_zarca

I was afraid sixty days was too late... I had actually hoped to get them out sooner, I guess I'm glad I didn't!

Our wedding is the weekend right after Memorial Day, so I assumed that people would need to be aware in case they were making vacation plans or had to make arrangements at work, etc. Not everyone we know is off on Saturdays, and they all need varying amounts of time to put in vacation time or to switch with somebody. I thought 'the sooner, the better'.

Also, I never said that I thought every woman should be invited to the wedding, but honestly, everyone invited to the wedding are people I care about anyway or else they wouldn't have been included in the first place. If I truly wanted "everyone", that would've been like, a 400 person wedding and a 200 person shower. Ridiculous. I know.

There are only 80 woman invited to the wedding, and I only put 49 of them on my shower invite list for my sister (and of those, 16 are bridal party and family, and 3 are out of town and likely won't make it, though I still wanted to at least include them), so that really only leaves 30 likely "guests"... That seemed fair to me......

chica_zarca

chica_zarca said:

There are only 80 woman invited to the wedding, and I only put 49 of them on my shower invite list for my sister (and of those, 16 are bridal party and family, and 3 are out of town and likely won't make it, though I still wanted to at least include them), so that really only leaves 30 likely "guests"... That seemed fair to me......

Whoops, it was 59, not 49. My mistake. But still, 40 guests didn't seem bad. I'm sure there will be a few that can't make it for various reasons, so it may be a bit lower in the end, but every single one of them is someone I truly appreciate in my life. Is it really that weird to have so many friends?

Inkdancer

chica_zarca said:

chica_zarca said:

There are only 80 woman invited to the wedding, and I only put 49 of them on my shower invite list for my sister (and of those, 16 are bridal party and family, and 3 are out of town and likely won't make it, though I still wanted to at least include them), so that really only leaves 30 likely "guests"... That seemed fair to me......

Whoops, it was 59, not 49. My mistake. But still, 40 guests didn't seem bad. I'm sure there will be a few that can't make it for various reasons, so it may be a bit lower in the end, but every single one of them is someone I truly appreciate in my life. Is it really that weird to have so many friends?

If you love them and feel close to them, it's not weird at all.