Plus Ones

Inviting plus ones is a bit of a controversial topic when it comes to weddings, so I'm going to do my best to be tactfully honest here. (While still expressing my true opinion on this topic!) Initially, we didn't extend plus ones to all of our guests for a number of reasons. As the RSVP deadline drew closer, we eventually decided to let all of our friends bring their dates. Below, I will outline the main arguments we had AGAINST inviting plus ones, justifying our original decision. (This is definitely something I've had to explain to a lot of people!)

Before I dig a little deeper into these arguments, I want to clarify what a "plus one" means to US. Let's say one of our friends has been seeing someone for a few years, maybe they live together, chances are we have hung out with both of them on multiple occasions. We wouldn't count our friend's date as a plus one; rather, we would address the invitation to both of them as a couple. We consider both of them to be our friends. On the flip side: if one of our friends has been seeing someone for a few months, maybe they're on and off, maybe they're a young couple, maybe we assume this isn't a long term relationship, or maybe we've only met them once or twice, that would be considered a plus one. We would address the invite to our friend, and a plus one for their date. (Whoever this happens to be at the time...)

I really hope no one takes offense to the above generalizations. As it turns out, five of our guests who were going to bring a plus one have since broke up, so I'm not wrong! If you're currently planning a wedding, know that breakups (among an array of other life events/emergencies) WILL happen, so make sure you can be flexible with your table/seating plan.

Most people would agree that bringing someone to a wedding signals that you're quite serious about the relationship; however, it doesn't mean you'll stay with that person forever. (Hence my above example of the five breakups!) When you invite plus ones, you might be inviting people to your special day that you will never see or meet again.  We couldn't possibly justify this, given our venue capacity. I've actually been to several weddings as a date for couples I had never met before, and have never seen or heard from since. Reflecting on this now, I actually feel somewhat guilty for having attended, taking up a valuable seat.

The number one (no pun intended) reason we didn't initially allow plus ones for everyone is due to our reception venue capacity. With all of our close friends and family, without plus ones, we still ended up sending out more invitations than our venue could actually accomodate. It came down to a matter of whether we were going to invite a few more friends, or extend plus ones. Obviously, we would rather have more people there who are important to us. So, this was the main reason we decided to axe the plus ones when we sent out our invitations.

Our reception venue capacity is 160, and we planned our budget with our venue assuming an attendance of 150. We invited upwards of 170, which was a little risky, but we knew that several people would likely decline. Once we started receiving a few decline responses, we felt good about changing our minds and allowing plus ones for our friends. Who said there was anything wrong with changing your mind!? ~♡~