Open bar vs cash bar

I needed to read this comment haha

It makes so much sense, but I am also a people pleaser as Megan mentioned she is, and it's hard to remember this all the time. I keep wanting people to think my wedding is amazing and thinking of all these ideas for them, when really it shouldn't be about that.

My Fiance and I had the same dillema! We decided on drink tickets (2 per person, other than our wedding party will get extra), with a few extra floating around that people can answer trivia questions (my uncle's idea) and get an extra ticket. Other than that they can purchase their own drinks. I also have wine on the table for dinner

We are doing open bar but wine is not included and ironically the venue is at a winery. we are debating if we want to purchase the wine but we are considering the cost. We decided that it was necessary to have an open bar because its a Latin Wedding. But if you are having an intimate wedding, the toast and wine during dinner should suffice!

I've learned that there are strong feelings around this topic lol! In my family, cash bar is the thing. However, since getting engaged, I've learned that's not for everybody (who knew?) so I had to consider an open bar. The cost was ridiculous - I just couldn't justify it. A nice alternative is a consumption bar. On our invitations we wrote: "The first few rounds are on us, but if you're feeling extra celebratory, a cash bar is available." This allows us to pay for an approximate number of drinks pp (we calculated at around 4 after dinner) and if people wanted more, they can do it on their own. It also discourages over-consumption, which is important to us as well. This way, for most people it'll be an open bar, but if there are those who want to drink a lot, then they'll have to pay.

I think that if your venue has wine included with dinner, that should definitely tie some people over and they can pay for their own drinks afterwards to keep the buzz going.

We're doing a limited open bar, where we are paying for glasses of house wines and domestic beers only. If people want shots or highballs, they're going to be on the hook.

We're doing so that basically each guest will have 2 drinks on us, and then cash bar after! So you can do a mix if that's possible!

Are you paying for their coffee, tea, pop and juice? Don't forget that if you do a cash bar, every little thing counts and I'd be a very annoyed guest if I had to pay for a Coke.

For the drink tickets, can you do a limited bar with a small selection of domestic (cheap) beers? $8 a beer is steep, it's usually $5-6 for a domestic so hopefully that can stretch your budget to a few more drinks. And with the free dinner wines and champagne toast, that would be fairly plenty.

You can also do a limited open bar. Pay for $2 drink a person and have any additional drinks be on the guests.

I think if you include unlimited wine during dinner and a champagne toast, there isn't a problem with having a cash bar if you feel like you don't want to spend the extra money. Just indicate that it will be a cash bar on the invitation so that your guests are prepared with money, and can adjust wedding gifts accordingly! If people are prepared, they can adjust their expectations beforehand and there's no reason for anyone to be disappointed.