Managing The Liquor Budget At Your Wedding Reception

If you are on a very tight budget, offer a cash bar where your guests are required to pay for their own drinks. However, some people consider this impolite since guests have hired babysitters, purchased gifts, and in some cases, traveled long distances to be in attendance for your wedding.

You can host an open bar where guests can enjoy all beverages at your expense. It easy to see than an open bar can get very expensive.  Many times people become more wasteful when they are not paying the bill. Another consideration with an open bar is the liability issues that can arise from an intoxicated guest leaving your reception and driving themselves home.

You can combine an open and cash bar. For example, you can set a time limit for the open bar for the first two hours and the remainder of the reception you offer a cash bar.  You are providing the best of both worlds by saving yourself money and giving time for the effects of the alcohol to wear off for the guests who may have over-indulged on the free drinks.

You can also choose to offer just the champagne for the toast.  Or offer your guests a champagne punch.  You will rarely find anyone getting intoxicated from a champagne punch.  

You can offer only complimentary beer and wine and choose to either allow the guests to purchase liquors at their own expense or decide to not to offer any additional liquors at all. Choose some good quality beer to be served from kegs. This option is less expensive than serving it by the bottle.

You can pre-purchase a certain number of bottles of wine then instruct the reception staff to inform you when you are reaching your limit. This way you can decide to purchase additional bottles or not.  If your reception is winding down, there is no reason to open up additional bottles of wine.   

If you just cannot afford to provide liquor, then you can choose to not serve any alcohol at all. You don’t want to start off your life together in debt because of your wedding reception expenses.

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