How much money guests should give as a wedding present

It’s the age-old debate: how much do you give the bride and groom when you’re invited to spend their wedding day with them?

There’s a lot of things to take into consideration, like how well you know them, whether they’re close family or friends and how much you can actually afford.

But now wedding website Easy Weddings has put the debate to rest, after they interviewed 4,100 couples between September and October last year, to ask them everything about wedding day etiquette.

The 2019 Annual Australian Wedding Industry Report found that guests were very generous indeed with their contributions.

“Wedding guests say an average of $120 per couple is considered an appropriate amount to spend on a wedding gift,” the report said.

“This increases to $220 per couple for close family or friends.”

The survey found 85% of people will have a wishing well at their wedding for guests to drop cards into.

It also revealed that the average cost per head for a wedding venue is $157, which may be why guests feel the need to contribute so much as a gift.

Interesting, wedding website The Knot claimed last year that $50 – $70 is a suitable amount to give a colleague or distant family friend or relative, according to Who.

They said $75 – $100 was a good gift for a friend or relative and $100 – $150 for a close friend or relative.

The debate about how much money to give at a wedding has been spoken about many times on Reddit, with one person asking if it’s ‘stingy’ to give $50 – $80 as a gift considering she’s a ‘close-ish’ friend of the bride.

“I’m leaning towards the lower end because I’m pretty poor and her wedding happens to be in January, so I’m still going to be broke from Xmas,” she said.

Most people told her that if the bride really was her friend then she would understand that she can’t afford to contribute more to her wedding.

“Write a personalised message (not just “Congratulations” etc) on the card and put $50 max in the envelope. Something better would be a small gift that resonates with the couple depending on how well you know them,” one person said.

“I go by how what the food/booze situation is. If it’s free booze and decent food I give like 100-150. If it’s cheap backyard wedding and cash bar, I give 50,” another person said.

The wedding guest conversation comes after it revealed yesterday that the median amount Aussie couples are spending on their wedding is $27,000.

The average amount people are coughing up to say ‘I do’ in style is $32,333 – $10,000 more than couples had originally planned on spending.

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