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To Invite or Not to Invite?

Planning a wedding proposes an ocean of dilemmas. Yellow or chocolate cake, traditional or personal vows, DJ or band, formal or casual, the list goes on forever. While all of these depend on the style of wedding you want to have, there is one question that almost every bride asks herself; do I invite coworkers or not?

For many, you see your coworkers more often than you see your friends and possibly even your family. They know your day-to-day and you may have even gone out with them socially outside of the office. But do you classify these people as friends and does your relationship with them warrant an invite?

I am in the last few weeks of my wedding planning and having just sent out the invitations recently I have had to decide my answer to this question. In my workplace there are teams or divisions of close knit, close quartered workers. I have developed what I would call friendships with my coworkers and they have definitely gotten earfuls of the rollercoaster ride that has been my wedding planning. I would venture to say that they know more about the wedding than my own mother. So when it came time to hand out invitations they wanted to see the finished product, but beyond that I wanted to invite them. Our wedding is three hours away so it is unlikely that they will actually come, and it’s possible that knowing that fact made my decision easier; however I truly wanted them to be there for my big day. I tried to hand out the invitation tactfully so as not to offend other people at the office by posting it in our cube pod and also told them in private that I would love to have them there.

Everyone’s work situation and environment is different and the dilemma around who to invite may vary according to your personal relationship with your co-workers.

Some of my friends and coworkers, all former brides-to-be, offered their experiences on how they handled the quandary of to invite or not to invite:

“I invited only those co-workers that I hung out with or were really close to at work. The outcome was good I think. I never heard any bad comments or ” I wasn’t invited”. My rule was . . . Invite who you want to be there . . . don’t worry about the politics. Your wedding is about you . . . not the office.”
Amanda, Merchandise Planner

“I know that I read somewhere that if you are not planning to invite co-workers to a wedding then you should consciously not talk about the planning and such in front of them. I tried my best to keep to that and only invited my closest co-workers. I guess doing this was successful.”
Renee, Allocator

“I invited my boss because I had been there about a year and everyone else in my office. I transferred to [a different department] two weeks before the wedding, and did not feel obligated to invite [them]. No problems there either- they still threw me a bridal shower and sent me off with good wishes!”
Roxy, Assistant Buyer

“I had just moved down to [the Private Brands division] about 9 months before my wedding, so really I had already kind of preliminarily planned out our guest list. I decided to only invite from work the people that I would invite to a party or something outside of work. It ended up being about 6 girls plus their guests, and I didn’t invite any just co-workers really. It would have been just too hard because I had moved around so much to invite people from my old office and my new one, and then I didn’t know if I should do formal invitations, or just verbally tell them, etc. I think it worked out ok b/c since I didn’t invite any co-workers I figured no one really felt left out – I hope at least! [My husband] on the other hand decided to invite his “team” basically, which was about 8 or so people, plus their guests. The only thing was, about 6 months or so before the wedding they added like 4 people to his team, who we did not invite and I still feel guilty about this. Because he ended up being really good friends with one of the guys who he is still friends with now, but we didn’t invite him. He figured if he started inviting outside of that it would be much harder to narrow it down and he would make people feel bad. In my opinion, regardless of what you do with invites, whether family or friends, someone’s feelings are always hurt and someone will feel like he/she should have been invited that wasn’t.”
Stephanie, Assistant Product Manager