I posted last night because my FI and I won a wedding reception at a local restaurant for up to 50 guests and were having great difficulty whittling the list down. Now, I have another question. We won this reception by having the most "likes" on our post on the restaurant's Facebook page. To get these "likes," we each posted general messages on our own Facebook pages with the link and asking everyone we knew to like and share. The good news is, it worked. The bad news is, we had over 600 likes, some from close friends and family members, some from acquaintances, and some from complete strangers. Obviously, I'm sure not everyone who "liked" this to help us win was expecting an invite to the wedding, but it certainly adds a layer of pressure to want to invite them as a thank you for helping us win.
Since we can only have 50 guests, we have decided to narrow our friends and family down to "circles" of groups, as others have suggested. FI is very close to his extended family, so his half of the invites will be almost all of his extended family, and the only two friends he is inviting are his two best friends, who will both be in his wedding party. I, on the other hand, am not very close with any of my extended family (this is a same-sex wedding, and some of my extended family were not approving when I came out and did not approve of me being in a same-sex relationship, so I have not been at extended family holidays or celebrations for several years). So in my case, I plan to invite my immediate family (mother, stepfather, siblings and their SOs), and plan to use the remainder of my invites for some of my closest friends. There are a few aunts/uncles who are very supportive, but I feel I cannot invite only some of them without creating family drama, so I am trying to stick to this "circles" approach and trying to offend the least by essentially eliminating the "extended family circle."
Here's my question: I know some of FI's friends (who I am also friendly with, as we have group dinners and get togethers several times per year) will be disappointed not to be invited. I'm sure some of my extended family may feel the same. I don't want to offend anyone, but we literally cannot have any more than 50 simply due to the space limitations of the venue. What would be the best way to handle this so as to try to explain the situation without insulting anyone and making them feel like "second class" or that they just didn't "make the cut?" The options I've come up with are:
1. Post a general post on each of our Facebook pages that can be seen by everyone thanking all of our friends and family for supporting us in the contest and explaining that we can unfortunately only invite 50 people, although we'd love to have everyone who supported us to say "thank you." - This lets everyone know without targeting anyone in particular to say "Sorry, you didn't make the cut," in my mind
2. Talking to some of FI's close friends who we know will be disappointed in advance to let them know the situation and say that to manage the restriction on guests, FI is only inviting family members plus his two best friends in the wedding party (the friends who are not invited also know the 2 who will be, so if we did not tell them, they would find out). - This is more direct and lets those close friends know we want to invite them but are only able to invite FI's family, though my concern is they will see pictures of my friends there. I worry that although this would explain the situation to them, it would make them feel left out or "second class."
3. Do nothing to proactively address it; just send out our invites to our 50 guests and don't mention it unless one of our close friends specifically asks why they were not invited
Basically, I know this is a crappy situation and people will be upset regardless. If this wasn't free, we would try to find some way to include everyone, but we have no wiggle room with this venue, and with our budget constraints (FI recently lost job and we both have student loans), we would not be getting married right now if we had not won this reception, so we definitely can't afford to try to plan something else on our own and give up the free reception. I'm just trying to figure out the best way to handle this with people who really matter to us but we cannot invite because of these constraints. Which option do you think is best? Or do you all have other suggestions that I haven't thought of?
Thanks in advance for your help.