What to do?

MyWedding13

FI and I are both pharmacy students, so our favors were going to be prescription bottles filled with personalized M&M's and labeled with "Prescription for love: Matthew and Alayna" with our wedding date. We think this is cute (and dorky) and we liked the idea of giving out food favors for guests to eat later. Now, we are wondering if we should do donations to a charity in honor of our guests. What do you all think?

future-mrs

The sticky at the top actually has some great input on this very subject.  You might check it out.

You're going to find that the majority of the board believes it's not really a "favor" to your guests to do donations in lieu of favors.

Simply Fated

Yeah, as far as the donations thing goes... some people are really against certain charities, even if the cause is agreeable.

I think the prescription bottle idea is really cute, though.

Beachy730

If you want to do a donation, then by all means, make a donation to the charity of your choice.  But please don't do it "in lieu of a favor," or call it a favor to your guests.  To me it says "I'm going to spend all this money on food, flowers, dress, etc, but I'm going to take the money from buying you a favor to donate it."  I would rather get no favor than hear a donation was given instead.

If you want to do a donation in honor of your guests, skip the centerpieces or the flowers, and you can put in your program that you donated in lieu of centerpieces.

MilleRsBest

Great idea- give people "pretend medicine" that looks like real medicine to take home and have their kids see, then take the real medicine they think is candy.

Oh but I'm sure your friends:
Don't have kids
Will have a talk with their kids
Will think it's cute

graysquirrel

I like your medicine bottle ideas. In regards to what pp said, if parents have not already had that conversation with their kids about meds, then that isn't OP's fault. They should be better parents. 

As far as the donations go, I would skip it. Favors are thank you's for the guests. Giving someone else $ isn't much of a thank you. Either give to charity or don't, but that sort of thing doesn't mix with weddings IMHO. 

sytom

Prescription bottles with candy inside are a great idea!  I

Just like the others, I don't think that donations are favors, as honorable as the intentions are.  However, I heard about someone that was selling her centerpieces to her guests.  The money that they raised was sent to a charitable cause.  I really liked that idea.

daysleeper3

The pill bottle idea is cute!  (I'm a pharmacist too).  My school would do invites to events the same way.

MyWedding13

I think we will do the pharmacy favor! Thanks for all of the positive feedback

tldh

Donations are not favors. 

As for the prescription bottles, other pharmacists have wanted to do this.  I've seen RNs on other boards plead with them not to because, if there is any chance of a child seeing candy in them, it's dangerous.  Kids thinking there is candy inside pill bottles apparently is a common cause for trips to the ER to have little stomachs pumped.

You can't watch a kid 24 hours a day and despite what gray squirrel said, you can be a great parent and still have accidents that happen.  I"m guessing she's never even babysat a toddler before (and yes they will sit there until they get a bottle open).

LiaAli

In my opinion I think that donations are favors. Half the time whatever you give your guests as favors they either throw out or forget about it so to me giving money to a worthy cause is a much better way to spend the money. I recently when to a wedding where they donated to the American Cancer Society because both the bride and groom had parents who lost their lives to cancer. I had no problem with the fact that they donated to the cure for cancer in my name then give me something with their name and wedding date on it that I would just throw in a drawer when I got home anyway.

MLekathLEEN

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/special-topic-wedding-boards_favors_what-to-do?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Special Topic Wedding BoardsForum:27Discussion:d1455ee6-f007-41e1-9997-28d451b726e6Post:5ca176cf-a7f1-43f1-864f-6c329201c9ac">Re: What to do?</a>:
[QUOTE]Great idea- <strong>give people "pretend medicine" that looks like real medicine</strong> to take home and have their kids see, then take the real medicine they think is candy. Oh but I'm sure your friends: Don't have kids Will have a talk with their kids Will think it's cute
Posted by MilleRsBest[/QUOTE]

Yes, because M&M's and my blood pressure medication look so similar.
OP- I think it's a really cute idea.