How To Announce A Dry Wedding
Weddings with no alcohol served are known as “dry weddings.” A dry wedding is more common than some would think, and the reasons for having one vary widely. Whatever the reason for having an alcohol-free wedding, there are always questions about when and how to inform your guests (if at all).
While many weddings have an open bar or cash bar during the wedding reception, a dry wedding usually has a combination of wedding drinks stations and waiting staff walking around offering non-alcoholic drinks to guests.
Ways to announce a dry wedding
When looking at how to inform wedding guests, there are a few options to consider. Part of that consideration of how to tell them also involves what you should choose to say to them.
Wedding invitations
For the majority of dry weddings, the invite does not mention that they are alcohol-free. However, if you decide to avoid mentioning it to avoid a backlash when the invites go out, you will likely want to let them know in another way. If you do not, then wedding guests will find out at the wedding. It may not stop someone’s disappointment from slipping out just because it’s your big day.
If you do mention “no alcohol” on the wedding invitation, that gives the invitees a chance to decline to attend. If they will decline to attend your wedding, just because they won’t be able to drink, do you really want them there at all?
Word of mouth
If you are worried it might come as a shock to some of your guests, we recommend you rely on word of mouth to spread the word amongst your more festive guests, to “soften the blow”.
Wedding website
This is the likely one of the best options to help advise people that it is planned be an alcohol-free wedding. In fact mentioning the wedding website on the wedding invitations is a better option than highlighting that it is a dry wedding on the wedding invites.
A wedding website is also a great tool for collecting RSVPs, so if you do choose to collect RSVPs this way then you can mention on the website that it is a dry wedding. Once some people have seen that it is a dry wedding on the wedding website the word of mouth will occur to help inform other wedding guests.
Wedding day timeline
If it’s a while until your wedding day and you’re pondering a dry reception, consider having a morning ceremony and an early afternoon reception. People are less likely to expect a full bar service, so you can feel a little better about not serving alcoholic drinks. Alcohol-free wedding receptions do not last as long as ones with a full bar service, so you may save on venue hire and staffing costs, too.
Wedding budget
As this is one of the main reasons to have a dry wedding it should be mentioned that not only does it save on alcohol costs but it can also save on venue hire and staffing costs. With the venue possibly not needing to be booked as long and requiring less staff to manage a bar, the wedding budget will benefit from these savings.
Reasons for a dry wedding
Having a dry wedding can be decided on due to a range of reasons by the wedding couple or maybe impacted by the parents wishes.
- Religion. One of the most common reasons to have a dry wedding is religious beliefs. This may be the wedding couple’s beliefs or that the parents are against alcohol for religious reasons.
- Recovering alcoholic. A close member of the wedding party or family maybe a recovering alcoholic and the wedding couple may choose to have a dry wedding in support of that person.
- Budget. The other main reason to have a dry wedding is the wedding budget. Alcohol costs can heavily impact the budget, and if ways to trim the budget are considered, a dry wedding is sometimes considered.
- Venue. The wedding reception venue may not have a liquor license or be able to obtain a temporary one and so the wedding couple may have to choose between a dry wedding at the venue or finding somewhere else to host the reception.
