Who pays for the bridal party hotel rooms?

Pic courtesy TripAdvisor.com

I did a little online research to find out exactly who is responsible to pick up the tab for the bridal party's overnight hotel stay.

It turns out there is no set standard for this practice, which is good. It means you have the choice of giving your bridal party a gift in the form of free hotel rooms; or, if you simply can't afford that, you can gently inform them of the price of the rooms so that they can book a room for themselves if they want it.

Of course, another way to inflate this dilemma is to have a large bridal party. It may be much more feasible if you only had a maid of honor and best man, to treat them to some free hotel rooms. But what if your bridal party consists of 20 people? Well, that's just crazy. You'd need some kind of Daddy Warbucks to fund this endeavor, and as indicated by the title NJ Wedding on a Budget, this is not that kind of blog.

So, now that we know you're not obligated to pay for bridal party hotel rooms... how do you politely break this news?

The answer: you include the information with the wedding invitations, and send one to them. If for some reason they might assume they're "exempt" from this because they're bridal party rockstars, you can emphasize the message with an email or a little note.

Your note could say something like, 

We have reserved a block of rooms at X hotel for Dates Y and Z. Book your room by Date X to be sure you receive the wedding discount. Call 1800 XXX XXXX for more information.

Easy peasy.