Weddings abroad are exciting, unusual and different but they can be an inconvenience for guests. This is weddingsireland.com’s advice on the right directions to a good destination wedding.
1- Plan and research
Before embarking on a foreign wedding, do your homework. Check out the country, the venue, the restaurant and also the accommodation possibilities for your guests, just to ensure there are plenty of rooms in the area for your chosen date.
Adapt your number of guests to the possibilities of the town/city/village chosen. If it’s not possible to reduce the number of guests, consider changing venue (a bigger town close by would be a good compromise).
2- Notice
Give your guests at least four months’ notice to give them enough time to book flight tickets and accommodation in the country. Some guidelines on how to get there will be necessary: which one is the most convenient airline, where to look for accommodation, map of the town with the venue, etc†¦
3- Accommodation
Make sure there are different prize options for the guests’ accommodation in the area: from hostels for the youngsters to B&B’s and top of the range hotels. Not everybody can ‘invest’ the same money when attending a wedding.
4- Accepting a ‘no’
When planning a wedding abroad you should be ready to accept some people will not be able to travel, be it for work reasons, economic issues or other personal circumstances. Don’t get offended and look at the bright side of things: those guests you didn’t really want to add to your list will probably not make the effort. The people who really care about you will be the ones attending your wedding.
5- Gifts
In most cases, the couple shouldn’t expect presents from the guests, when traveling to their wedding from abroad. Taking into account the cost of flights and accommodation, the best wedding gift is their presence. Little token presents are a good touch, though.
6- Website
Consider setting up a website where the guests can find out all the information and links they need to organize their trip. You could also use it as a newsletter with latest news, in case something doesn’t quite work as expected and there are some last minute changes.
