Anyone axing the open bar?

I postponed my April wedding until September 2020 It will be outside with 100 people under a tent at the hall.

I am Italian so it will seem a little cheap not to have an open bar while people are putting a lot of money into envelopes. (since there's no dancing might as well drink!)

View quoted message I did the math. Under normal circumstances, the open bar is definitely more cost effective, especially when there's a late night food station and dancing. If we're cutting the party short, it may change but it also depends on who's invited at the end.

View quoted message We were always going to do per consumption, we did the math and its much cheaper than paying the open bar fee for everyone. With gathering restrictions we are still keeping the per consumption. Id ask your venue to help you out with the math they have the experience and had
Proof to back it up that 95% of the time per consumption is way cheaper than open bar.

View quoted message If I'm going to do a consumption bar, then I would want to save a significant amount, like at least 50%. And once I factored in individual drink prices at that total, it's like 2 drinks per person. I feel like I'm being skimpy at that point.


Will have to see who we invite when the time comes, I guess.

Ours is completely dry due to alcoholism on FH side and my stepfamily are not fun drunks. If people dont like it thats on them! We can have a great time qithout booze.

I'm hoping my wedding gets postponed all together rather than not have any dancing, guests having to wear masks and the rest. My venue prices are with open bar so I would still be doing that no matter what. I'll be losing enough. I won't be able to have the antipasto buffet that we are supposed to have. We have been waiting 8 years so we could have the wedding we wanted and not have to compromise. I rather wait another few years than have all the restrictions.

We are planning an open bar for our August 2021 wedding (postponed from this year). I'm also in Ontario and find open bars are very common here. I think I've only ever been to one wedding that wasn't open bar actually, and they didn't have any booze (it was a lunch wedding/no dancing, and the couple didn't drink at all). If the restrictions are still 50 people indoors and no dancing, I agree with you that it likely wouldn't be worth it. If you'd still like your guests not to have to pay for drinks, I wonder if there would be an option to just pay for what everyone drinks, rather than paying the $40-60 per person fee. It's worth discussing with your venue!

View quoted message No, any time I've been to a party with an open bar it's completely open. No budget, no limits. It's far more common to have a toonie bar where guests pay $2 and the couple pays the remaining bar tab after. Table wine is also very popular, some venues allow you to bring that in yourself.


My office gives us drink tickets for parties, partly to save costs but mostly so they don't encourage excessive drinking. That's always an option if you want to meet in the middle.

We were skipping the open bar. I didn't want to have a lot of drunk guests to worry about and my FH and I aren't drinkers.

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Do venues in NB not cap the price for open bar? For example, in Ontario if we have an open bar, it's $40 - $60 per person depending on the venue. The only caveat is, it applies to everyone regardless if they have 1 drink vs 20, even those who only drink water.

My fiance and I weren't even planning on having open bar since we know our friends and family can drink a lot and we're not wanting to pay for that. We're doing cash bar instead. If they want to drink a lot, then they can pay for it themselves

We were always skipping the open bar. They aren't super common in our area but mostly I didn't want our friends and loved ones to drink us into debt!