More Invitations than Guests

celticbeauty

Help! My FI and I only want 150 guests MAX. My parents gave us a list with 105 guests (they obviously don't get boundaries). They color coded who they thought would for sure say no and who they would be surprised to come. The number they believe will come for sure is 22. If I include the for sures and the maybes it comes out to 65 (which is better, but still 15 over what we were giving them). The number they think are NOs is 40. I recognize that there will be people who won't come and a lot of these people would have to travel a couple of hours to attend the wedding, but I also don't want to be surprised with a TON of extra people that we weren't budgeting on to come.

What is the typical number of invitations? Do people send out only the max number of people they want to come or do they send out more than that knowing not everyone one will make it? Please advise!!

JKcarlen

Our venue fits 300 and we invited 340, anticipating several invitees not to come. If we do end up having over 300 which I highly doubt will happen.. Worse case scenario we put overflow on the patio with a walled tent. I've heard a general ballpark is that 20% won't come but you need to factor in where your guests are traveling from, time of year, etc.

AurorasEnvy

I would not invite more people than you guys can fit/afford/want at your wedding, because there is always the off chance that you'll have near 100% attendance.  I'm inviting 200, realistically anticipating 150, but will be able to accommodate 200.

I'd give your parents a number of people they can invite, and leave it up to them to trim their list down.

Amt2109

Who's paying for the wedding?

If your parents are paying, then they get a lot of leeway with the invite list. Unless I read it wrong, you don't mention how many your venue can hold? You should definitely budget and plan for 100% attendance.

If you guys are paying, without your parent's help, then take the list back to them. Ask them to trim it down, and stick to your original 50 guests that you gave them.

JKcarlen, I really hope you don't come a cropper with your strategy. TBH, I'd be peeved if I'd travelled to a wedding to be stuck outside away from the action because you didn't plan properly.

TiffannieF

Yes you need to plan for 100% attendance. Those you are no's can you just send a wedding announcement? Why are they no's, is it travel reasons? We had some people RSVP yes that we were surprised they said yes. We invited 124 and 100 showed up (20 of the no's were our single friends who we allowed to bring a guest but they came single, thankfully). We were crossing our fingers fir 100 people but could afford the 124. I was hoping 100 because of our single friends. Also for invitations I ordered 10 extra just in case and I'm glad I did, I used all but one.

meganb1977

Ditto pp's.  You need to be able to accommodate 100% attendance and it's not a good idea to invite more people than you can handle, in anticipation of regrets.  Especially if you and your fiance are paying for the wedding, take the list back to your parents and ask them to cut it down to the number you originally suggested or suggest that you will invite the "for sures" and ask them to prioritize the "maybes".  If your parents are paying, you can draw it to their attention if the total number when you add up the people your parents are inviting, the people you and your fiance are inviting, and the people your fiance's family are inviting, is going to put it over your venue's capacity and/or over budget, but the final decision will be up to them.  If your parents are paying and it's your and fiance's personal preference to keep the guest list under a certain number to keep it more intimate you can let your parents that you don't feel comfortable having over a certain number of people there and you don't want to be stretched too thin trying to acknowledge everyone, but again the final decision will lie with your parents.