Favors, To Do or Not To Do

bunny2010

Ok everyone here is my thought on the whole favor thing. I understand that it is tradition to give your guest a little trinket of your day, however those of us who are footing the bill for the wedding, it just seem a little excessive.  I mean we are already providing a free family style meal at maggiano's, that means they can eat as much as they want and of course they have the open bar for 6 hours.......Do we seriously need to give out favors as well?  What is the tradition behind this?  I mean half the time guest leave the favor behind anyway.....Thanks for you input ladies..........

sammyjo0320

I am going to say yes you should do them. For our wedding we went cheap on the favors..we went to Michaels and got little fabric bags and filled them with candy. its simply and cheap but people appriciate it. its nice to have candy to snack on throughout the night.

mbcdefg

I also do not get why so many people think this is mandatory. Like you said, you're feeding people and giving them free alcohol for several hours ... I don't get why a little baggie of M&Ms is going to make or break their night. I don't think couples should HAVE to give a favor. If there's something you WANT to give, go for it, but don't feel like you must. If a guest leaves a wedding grumbling about not receiving a dollar's worth of candy or a candle or something, after having eaten and drank for several hours, and if I personally thanked them for coming and will send out a thank you card later ... then frankly I don't really care if they think I'm an ingrate because there's no pleasing someone like that.

kelmcgee

I understand it from both sides really but we are still doing something.   We ended up pleasing both our parents and we are giving a donation to the Heart & Stroke foundation and giving a heart keychain.    

danieliza1127

We didn't give favors.Some weddings do and some don't.  The two I went to recently that did, we forgot to take ours home! 

wildangel2189

I agree that favors are not necessary we were not going to do them because like you we are footing the bill, but the friend of ours that is doing the food (as a wedding gift to us) saw that we were not going to have favors and decided to make homemade candies in our wedding colors for our guests.  Hooray for friends!

dsouldiva

If you can't afford to do them, skip them, no-one is going to be worried about it.I certainly don't think it's bad etiquette to skip them, liek you say it's nice if you have the budget for them but not when you're footing the bill youself!

MeaghanandMichael

Favors are absolutely unneccessary and more than not just regarded as trinkets o' crap by wedding goers. Try to do something edible if you do give favors or just go without. No one needs another mismatched coaster set or a lighter that barely lights.

Leah&Christian09

Favors are totally not necessary. We took the $3-500 that we would have spend on favors and added a few extra apps to our cocktail hour. As a guest, I'd definately prefer better food/bev to some goofy keychain or coffee mug. If you insist on doing them, make something edible.

duckie1905

As a guest I would rather not get some crap trinket that will just end up in the garbage as soon as I get home.  If you feel you must go edible.

aerinpegadrak

I wouldn't worry too much about doing favors.  For our part, I was leaning toward serving some really yummy gourmet popcorn as part of our dessert spread; I might pick up some sort of to-go container and let people call that the favor.  It's really low on the priority list, though.

jenn.daniel

Don't worry about favors. I'm only going to do them b/c I found individual after dinner mints that have "Mr. & Mrs" on the wrapper. I can get enough for all the guests for a total of about $10.

SarahPLiz

IMO, they are not necessary. I only really notice them and take them home if they are edible.. giving me a bookmark, picture frame, bottle of bubbles, or matchbook.. or NOT givingme those things, does not change my opinion of the B&G.

TurtlesAllTheWayDown

I agree with you. Favors are one of the first things I'll cut out if I need to. Most people don't even take them home. I've never gotten a favor that I loved, and I'm relieved when I don't get them because then I don't have to take something home. Free food and alcohol should be enough. ;-)

tenofcups4me

Fortunately, they're not done in my crowd so I didn't have to think twice about it. It wasn't a question of cost, just that it seemed silly -- why would I have an elegant, expensive wedding and then give my guests a cheap trinket to remember it?

Lasairiona

Favors are never required and are the first thing to go if cost is a concern. Most people skip them and guests don't miss them if they aren't there. In fact, the last wedding I attended, the couple spent a ton of money on edible favors, had them sitting out in plain sight and no one picked any of them up. The only tradition behind favors is that they're something the wedding industry invented to swindle money out of gullible brides with the idea that they're required and that if you don't have them, your wedding will be ruined. Neither of those are true despite what they want you to believe.

fallbride1109

Don't do them.  Take it from someone who is 3 days away.  They are not worth the time, money, or effort.  I feel like a complete idiot for doing them, especially when all the brides here told me not to.  I wish I had listened.

megk8oz

You don't need to do them ... chances are, your guests won't miss them. If you DO do them, though, I reccomend going with something edible. Edible=easy to solve problem if people leave them behind (Just eat them yourselves. That's my "master scheme", lol) Something like those stupid-@$$ champagne flutes that people give out w/the B&G's names and the date engraved on them always get left by 1/2 the guests. The other 1/2 take them to be polite and then either promptly discard them, or leave them in a back of a cabinet to collect dust. And there is no "logical" resolution to the dealing w/ the left-behinds, so they essentially=money down the toilet.

fairy_diva

You know, I was considering buying favors for my guests, but after all the comments and thoughts you guys are right, I don't need them.  I'm doing bird seed organza bags for the send off, and had thought about Thank You bookmarks, but I'll just skip them now. I can't remember the favors at the last handful of wedding I've been too and I would hate to waste money on a throw away item.  Instead of favors, what do you think about small cake boxes for people to take home a piece of cake? Worth the money or not?I may computer print a Thank You for joining us and put with my Programs instead. 

holovach1

I was worried about the cost of favors as well and what I decided to do was make coaster that could be taken home (I got the instuctions from another Knottie). She put her monogram on them and gave them out in groups of 4 but I used pictures that went with my theme and am putting one at each place setting. They were VERY inexpensive and if guest leave them behind I can take them home and use them myself. I also have made special one in groups of 4 with pictures of my bridal parties children (since they all have kids) to give as gifts.