Wedding Etiquette: Cash Bar Wedding Parties

Open bar wedding party has been gaining popularity these days because more and more couples have been celebrating an evening wedding. With open bar, guests are free to order any brand of drink to their liking without limit as to how many shots or glasses they should order.

However, some couples with limited budget see cash bar as the best option for them.  As opposed to open bar, guests must pay for every drink that they order in a cash bar wedding party. The newly weds won't be held liable for a guest's non-payment of a drink ordered. Guests should leave a bill for a drink the way a customer does when he ordered a drink in a local bar.

If you, a groom or bride-to-be, are concerned with wedding etiquette, wedding etiquette specialists will tell you not to go for a cash bar. If you would be graded for a wedding etiquette examination, saying yes to a cash bar has a grade of zero.

For specialists on wedding etiquette, cash bar is not an option even for couples who are tight on a budget.  Since cash bar violates wedding etiquette, wedding etiquette specialists say that you should expect snide remarks from your guests if you pursue a cash bar wedding party. You might even hear them saying things like, the newly wed do not know wedding etiquette, or if they couldn't afford an open bar, they shouldn't have hosted a cocktail party at all and they should have stayed with a sit down dinner.

Guests who would make such a remark obviously are unaware of wedding etiquette too. But just the same, we cannot silence them for making such remarks.

Some wedding etiquette books even say that if you are thinking of a cash bar night party, make a pass for a night party; it's better not to have a night party at all if it would be a cash bar.

- Solution to Cash Bar

There is a solution though to cash bar. According to books on wedding etiquette, you can implement the semi-open bar. With this strategy, you won't worry about violating wedding etiquette through cash bar and you won't need a big budget to throw an open bar wedding party.

Wedding etiquette specialists would recommend you to open bar the first two drinks to your wedding guests and cash bar the ordered drinks thereafter.

Two drinks are considered socially acceptable standards for social drinking. In implementing the semi open, semi cash bar wedding party, you have satisfied the needs of guests expecting you to practice wedding etiquette while at the same time you have satisfied yourself for not spending too much.

Many couples who are not limited on a budget implement the two-drink open bar and cash bar afterwards cocktail or evening wedding party. This is to avoid excessive drinking from wedding guests, and for wedding guests to maintain social composure.