Have you or anyone you know had an open bar at a wedding reception?

Question

What ended up being the total bill off of how many people? What are the pluses and minuses to doing this?

We are going to have free beer but are thinking about expanding the bar to being open to anything.

I just wanted to add that where I live everyone has the beer, wine and champaigne for free. No one around here does an open bar. Everyone is used to beer for free.

Answer 1

Hi,

Most weddings i've been to have been free beer, wine and softdrink/juice only. That's what we will be having, and that's what most people expect! If guests want spirits, they will pay for them themselves.
Having said that, my brother opted to have a fully open bar at his wedding reception which was VERY generous of him as most of his friends prfered to drink spirits, and I think his bill was around $3000 for about 100 - 120 ppl.

So as I said our guests will be offered beer, wine and softdrinks, and will payfor their own spirits, but what we have also decided to do to ensure everyone can enjoy the night and drink if they choose too is hire a bus with driver to take guests to the reception for free and bring them home again.

:o)

Answer 2

I've been to about two dozen weddings in my lifetime so far, and all but one was open bar (the other was a brunch reception for a tee-totalling couple). I guess it depends on the crowd, but it's pretty much expected in my circles. (At least beer and wine.) I suppose it can be expensive. Ours is included in the per-person package price with our venue that includes the facility, dinner, champagne toast, cake, coffee service, cocktail and hors d'oeurvre hour and an additional four hours of open bar. I suppose the two down sides are the potential cost (particularly if you are charged per drink rather than per person), and the possibility that some guests will drink too much. The up side is that it makes for a classier event. If you don't want to, or can't afford to, pay for hours of an open bar, then you have several options: don't serve alcohol at all, serve a limited bar (beer and wine, for example), or restrict the amount of time the bar is open (perhaps to just the cocktail hour, or perhaps no cocktail hour and just two hours after dinner--just know that when the bar closes, a lot of people will take that as a sign to leave). However, please do not have a cash bar. It is the height of rudeness to ask your guests to pay for anything. Provide what you can and don't feel guilty about what you can't.

Answer 3

Hi. Yes, we did for my son's wedding...sort of. Well, receptions here are long (6 hours), so we only had open bar for 3 hours, then just beer and wine after that and open bar for anyone in the wedding party and parents, etc. Does that make sense? We live in an area of the country with BIG drinkers (beer mostly), but I wanted to do it for my son. We only have 2 kids and this is our only son and we could afford it.

Now, that said, even though we have long receptions, almost 90% of the people are gone by 11 p.m., so the last hour is really slow...as in .... not many drinkers.

Anyway, we had around 150 people (about 20 of those being kids), and our total was $2,000 (with tax and gratuity), that includes pop for the kids. So really, I did not think that was all that bad. Actually, probably cheap compared to other parts of the country because I live in a very rural part of the country.

Hope this helps.

Answer 4

I had an open bar at my wedding, but it was included in the package deal. I got married at a pretty expensive place, and the meals were $109 per person, not including tax/grat, we had to pay $28 a bottle for butler passed wine, but the open bar was included for 5 hours. We had a cocktail hour outside right after the ceremony and then another 4 hours of open bar when we moved into the banquet room. I would absolutely suggest open bar at your wedding. I think cash bar is so cheap, and it just doesn't look good. My sister had a cash bar, and people keep talking about how much it sucked. These people are your guests and they're giving you gifts and money. I know you pay for the dinner plate and everything else, but if you invited them to a party at your house would you make them pay for their drinks? No, you wouldn't. Why do it at your wedding? Chances are you'll recieve enough money from the guests to cover the extra expense. My wedding in TOTAL was about $16,000, and I had only 50 people. The meal/venue was most of that cost. Good Luck.

Answer 5

I've never been to a wedding with an open bar, but I wish I had - cash bars are just bad taste.

You could have a limited bar - beer, wine and the liquor of your choice.
It's always cheaper to buy your own alcohol and bring it in, however not all reception venues will allow this. But if they do, this is what I would recommend.

Answer 6

Yes, of course we did, for 200 guests. Cocktail hour, it was closed for the dinner - there was wine on the tables - then for the full night, which was probably til 1 a.m.
Can't recall the bill, but it was WAY less than we thought. We were able to bring our own booze in, and just had to pay corkage at the reception site.
Of the 20 weddings I have been to, only one had a cash bar. People just don't do that - you are hosting guests for your wedding, and that includes a meal and a full open bar. There are NO minuses of being good hosts.

Answer 7

I think you should look at your guest list and see if you can get an idea of how much they will drink, based on your knowledge of your guests...some people drink more than others. I would never have had an open bar at my wedding, because both sides of the family like to drink and party hardy...we would have had an enourmous bill.

My best friend happened to have some money left over in her budget for the venue she reserved, so they put that toward an open bar...$500 was gone in two hours. We drank hard that night and had a great time...

Maybe you can compromise and put X amount toward an open bar, and after that people have to pay for their own hard A drinks..other than that beer is free and so are the soft drinks.

Answer 8

I"ve been to several dry weddings, several weddings that had open bars, and many that were somewhere in between. Ours will be somewhere in between: beer, wine, sodas, and a champagne toast. The venue provides coffee, tea, water, and non-alcoholic punch. The beer/wine/soda bar is costing us $15 per person, for each person over age 21. (about $1500 in all) A full bar is really expensive. Plus, people tend to not get as drunk with beer and wine as they do with hard liquor.

Answer 9

I am having an open bar at my reception. It's $12.50 a person and includes unlimited drinks for 5 hours. Includes house wines, two different kinds of beers, and all call brand liquor (Smirnoff, etc.) with juice and other kinds of mixers.

So I'm planning on 130 people coming, so the total will be: $1,625.00.

If I were to include frozen drinks, champagne, and more expensive options, it would obviously be more per person.

Answer 10

Here is what we did, it worked out great for us. We set aside $1,000 for alcohol at our reception. Out of this we bought two kegs of beer. We told the reception site that when we ran out of the $1,000 budget, it would go to a cash bar. The cocktail hour started at 5:15 and the open bar closed around 8:00 I believe. We wanted everyone to drink and have fun, but we did not want to go overboard. We had about 175 guests and it kept the dance floor open all night.

The only warning is the more free alcohol you provide, the more your guests will drink. If they decide they want to drive after drinking all night, that is going to be on you. We had our reception in a hotel so they guests could drink all they wanted and then not drive anywhere. Keep that in mind, safety first. Best of luck!