Wedding Guests Forced To Pay $10 To Get A Plate For The Buffet — 'If You Didn't Pay, You Didn't Get Food'
Guests had no idea they weren't getting fed unless they paid.
Ground Picture | Shutterstock A cash bar is nothing to balk at for an event like a wedding, but usually, there's some notice on the invitation. Something that's not quite as common is a fee to eat, but that's exactly what one wedding guest reported encountering without warning at a recent reception.
A guest took to Reddit claiming the bride and groom didn't go the traditional route when it came to feeding their guests at their reception. Basically, without any warning, an announcement was made that each person, including children, had to shell out $10, which earned them a plate they could use for the buffet.
Wedding guests were forced to pay $10 to get a plate for the buffet.
"I went to a wedding where the couple decided not to cater in the traditional sense. Instead, they hired a local buffet restaurant and then charged guests ten dollars at the door to get a plate," they began in their Reddit post.
Zeeshan Nelson | Pexels
They explained that at first, all the other wedding guests just assumed it was some sort of joke, until they noticed someone at the entrance was actually collecting cash. If the guests refused to pay, it meant that they weren't able to eat at all. The problem was that the guests didn't even know about the fee before the wedding, and some of them had brought their kids along, not knowing they would need to pay for their plates as well.
The issue was more so that guests weren't given a heads-up about the cost of the plate prior to attending.
It's not exactly common for guests to pay for their plates at weddings, and many commenters were quick to point this out, but the bigger issue with this event was the fact that guests weren't told about the cost before attending. Simply put, what if they didn't have the cash to pay?
One commenter put it simply, "People getting married need to plan the event they can afford to host and if they're doing things any other way need to communicate to their guests in advance what the event will look like. Anything else is a no and tacky as hell."
Okay, tackiness aside, the number of people who carry cash with them nowadays is few and far between, and that number grows exponentially when you're talking about an event like a wedding. The wedding guest admitted that it led to a bit of an awkward moment as others realized that the bride and groom were, in fact, not joking. What if you arrived with your entire family of 4? You'd need $40 in cash. Chances are, some of your family members aren't eating.
According to The Knot, the average catering cost in the U.S. is $80 per person. However, that number is entirely dependent on factors such as the location of the wedding and the company providing the food. Midwest weddings had the lowest prices, while Mid-Atlantic had the highest.
Sure, in light of those numbers, $10 a plate is a bargain, but if you're also paying for transportation, a new outfit, a gift, and maybe even a hotel for the night, that extra charge isn't exactly welcome. Maybe that's why the bride and groom decided to spring it on guests at the last minute.
The bride insisted that paying for your plate was cheaper than buying a gift.
"A few people even left rather than shell out more money. Meanwhile, the bride kept repeating, 'It’s cheaper than buying a gift!' as though that made it better. Everyone left talking about the ten-dollar buffet ticket instead of the actual wedding," they continued.
To me, that kind of reasoning comes from a person who knows they messed up and doesn't want to own the embarrassment. Okay, it's her day, let her get away with this line of thinking, too. I mean, as the guest even wrote, this wedding will go down in history because of the $10 buffet, not because people had a great time.
Weddings are expensive. It's understandable if the bride and groom would try to save money, but this really wasn't the way. As the commenter pointed out, couples need to plan the wedding they can afford instead of putting the onus on guests to pay for the wedding they want.
Nia Tipton is a staff writer with a bachelor's degree in creative writing and journalism who covers news and lifestyle topics that focus on psychology, relationships, and the human experience.
