When it comes to creating your wedding guest list, it’s tempting to invite everyone who’s related to you, are friends with, or maybe just people you’re acquainted with. It was definitely hard for my husband and I when it came to narrowing down our guest list.
We wanted to invite both sides of our families from close family to in-laws, friends out of state and even our church members. However, we knew it was impossible and we had to limit our guest count to 300 people. Then when Covid came around and affected our wedding plans, we had to reduce our guest count to 150 people.
I know it can be hard to reduce your guest count but it’s possible. Knowing how to reduce your guest count can be helpful if your venue max capacity has changed due to Covid. Keep reading to learn more about how you can reduce your guest count and politely turn down uninvited guests.
1. Before Anything, Make Sure Your Guest List Includes Your Wedding Party, Both of Your Families, Friends, and Influential People
Don’t forget to include you, your Fiance and your wedding party in your guest count as well as your vendors, decor team and ushers. Also make sure you’ve included all your immediate family members. This includes you and your Fiance’s parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and niece/nephews.
Determine who your closest friends and most influential people are in your life. Don’t just invite people you feel obligated to invite. Really think about if that person is really close to you or had some sort of impact on your life. This can include your closest friends, your church pastor/leaders, or maybe even a close co-worker.
2. Reduce Your Guest List By Determining Who the Most Distant People Are
The most distant people are going to be your friends, influential people and co-workers. It’s really hard to cut these people out because they had some sort of impact in your life and you want them to be there on your big day. However, if you really look at it, they are not the closest people to you; your families are.
If you’ve already added them to your guest list and have to cut them out, simply contact them and tell them, “I’m really sorry to say this. However, due to certain circumstances (venue max capacity changes, covid regulations, etc), we’ve decided to limit our wedding to families only and to those helping out with the wedding such as vendors, ushers and decorators. We hope you understand”.
3. Cut Out Distant Family Members
If you still need to reduce your guest count and have already cut out the most distant people on your list, start determining who your distant family members are and remove them from your list.
This is also a hard move because family is family, but try to cut out the people who aren’t closely related to you. This includes your in-laws’ in-laws, your parents’ aunt/uncles, etc. Basically people who aren’t your parents, siblings, grandparents, cousins or niece/nephews should be removed from the list.
If you’ve already added them to your guest list and have to cut them out, contact them and tell them (almost) the same thing stated in point 2, “I’m really sorry to say this. However, due to certain circumstances (venue max capacity changes, covid regulations, etc), we have to limit to immediate families only and to those helping out with the wedding such as vendors, ushers and decorators. We hope you understand”.
4. Remove Everyone From Your List Except Parents, Siblings, and Vendors (Worst Case Scenario)
If, at this point, you still want the wedding to continue, you’ll have to remove everyone besides your parents, siblings and vendors/decor team. This will ensure you have the closest and dearest family members there on your special day. You usually shouldn’t have to go this route unless your venue’s max capacity has been strictly limited to around 25 guests.
If you’ve already added them to your guest list and have to cut them out, contact them and tell them, “I’m really sorry to say this. However, due to the change in our venue’s max capacity, we have decided to keep our wedding small and reduce our guest count to our closest immediate families only as well as those helping out with the wedding such as vendors, ushers and our decor team. We hope you understand”.
5. How to Say “No” to Guest Requests
This goes for guests who ask if they can bring a “plus one” or if an uninvited guest asks to attend your wedding. If you don’t have room for extra guests, make it clear in your wedding group/event page or personally contact them and let them know.
What you can say to politely decline their request is, “We would love to have you (or their plus one) at the wedding however, we are already at our venue’s max capacity and cannot invite anymore people. If anything changes and we have room for you (or their plus one), I’ll let you know. I hope you understand”.
Or, you can say, “We would love to have you (or their plus one) at the wedding however, we are only allowing immediate family to attend and aren’t allowing “plus ones”. If anything changes, I’ll let you know. I hope you understand”.
I hope you found these tips helpful! It can be hard to reduce your guest count, especially if your venue capacity has been affected by Covid. However, I hope these tips helped you reduce your guest count and say “no” to uninvited guests.
