Stag and doe

Going cheap can work, but I would recommend a door prize and sell entry tickets. I know I will be doing this. I also heard of ppl doing this. Another point, people will buy tickets just to show support and not even attend the event. During the summer someone is always selling stag and doe tickets. So back to the point. One large gift/splurge can earn you hundreds of dollars.

Like Kelly said - they are a bit of a big deal here in MB - but of course we have different laws for alcohol and prizes and whatnot that makes it easier for us to execute and make money. A good Wedding Social should profit in the 5 digit mark ideally.

Here's a link to my post about my Wedding Social that we held back in March 2019: Wedding Social Complete!

Wedding socials are huge here in Manitoba and the prizes are INSANE....its gone too far in my opinion and it makes for a very stressful event. I've seen people give away trips to Vegas, floor tickets to concerts...its totally nuts.

This may not be the case where you're from, but in my experience, if the prizes kinda suck, then people don't want to win them and wont buy tickets.

The trick is to get things on sale. We bought a fire pit at an end of summer sale for a good price. Also took advantage of black Friday and boxing day sales. Its normal for parents and the wedding party to throw in things to help out. We asked if they could donate a bottle of wine to the wine basket prize and an item for another basket theme.

We had 4 grand prizes for our social. A smart TV (bought on black friday), a Kate Spade purse (bought at the Kate Spade outlet on extra sale), a bike (donated to us by my fiance's boss), and a basket of wine (all donated by wedding party /family) and tickets to a bunch of theatre shows (we work in theatre, so we were able to snag ticket donations from all the local theatres.

Tap into your resources. Take advantage of sales. Buy things that are hot right now (wireless earbuds, instant pots...things people are interested in having).

Dollar store items are great for "fillers" (items to fill out the prize to make it look bigger/more inciting, but aren't the main element), but this is not what makes people buy tickets.

As long as you're in a place that does these regularly, & I find if you're more active in the community you can make a decent profit. Although a friend of mine was in BC, tried going back to MB to have a social (what we always call it), & it was a total flop. Because she wasn't around there anymore, most didn't come out to support, as it was in the city instead of our hometown & the people there didn't want to travel. Because it was in a bar/stripclub we also had a lot of other customers trying to come in, eventually we allowed them, if they bought a ticket at the door. We put together a decent prizes, each bridesmaids/groomsmen had their own prize pkg to come up with (booze, money tree, camping pkg, etc) also like others suggest, look into businesses around you. I've known others to contact the big sports teams around & some have actually gotten really good prizes from them. 50/50 is also really good to have. Or have a separate big booze pkg (Texas Mickey or such) & sell tickets (usually bridal party goes around & sells arm's length tickets). It can be a lot of work, my sister wanted me to do one, but I told her no as I didn't want to spend the money & not have the turn out as I'm also not living around there anymore.
Good luck!

The stag and does I've helped with we, as the wedding party, donated a bottle each to make up a big prize of alcohol which always goes over well. We had a grand prize (the couple donated) two picked a tv and the other one a BBQ. We called every business we could think of for donations (it was a ton of work) two of the stag and does were very successful the other (a very introverted couple) broke even, maybe. You definitely want to spend as little to get the most you can. Any business you frequent regularly will be your best bets.

It can be seen as a fundraiser for your wedding with family and friends to come out celebrating your day in advance before the actual day. Getting the help from the wedding party is good since they can handle all the work and you two enjoy the drinks and fun party time.

Prizes wise, baskets of different things of baking, food (meat/cheese/crackers), sports, mystery boxes, and more to help bring everyone to their favourite area. 50/50 and a few raffles is good too if you want to include them.

I think the main idea is to spend as little as possible in order to profit as much as possible, but with that being said, prizes have to vary. There’s always at least one grand prize of some sort. For the ones I’ve participated in organizing we’ve always asked local businesses and had friends and family who have business to donate gift baskets and coupons. People will buy tickets no matter what but if there isn’t an x box, tv or a go pro or something they’ll buy fewer. My friend went to the states to get the big prizes.

If you’re worried about prizes, you could also do a 50/50 draw. Then it’s both donation and in incentive since they’d get money too.

It depends on how cheap the prizes are. i mean people go to a stag and doe knowing theyre going to be giving money to the bride and groom. i know a lot of people like to do raffles so many people buy tickets but ur only giving away one prize.