Welcome Bags: Yes or No?

[MickeysStarTrader]

I'm considering the prospect of welcome bags for our guests but I really can't decide if they're a good idea or not. I think we're looking at inviting around 60 guests and I was thinking about doing one welcome bag per couple (so around 30 bags). I've worked out what I would put in the bags and where I'd buy everything from in a way that's not too expensive. I would really like to do them because I can make them affordable and I think it would be really nice since everyone would be making a real effort to attend our wedding. Just as a gesture of gratitude for making the trip. I'm just worried that perhaps they won't be appreciated, or that things I'm thinking of putting in there to be useful will actually just end up in the trash, in which case I might as well save the money I'd use for welcome bags and put it toward our honeymoon. But then I'd feel selfish

What are your views? Are you doing welcome bags? If you've already done welcome bags, what did your guests make of them? Do you think they used the contents? If it has any bearing on the situation, we will be giving all of our guests favors regardless of whether or not we do welcome bags. Thanks for your help!

 

[lurkyloo]

I gotta be honest... As a guest, I love getting a welcome bag, but as a bride I skipped them, and nobody even noticed. I think really the only people who know to expect a welcome bag are those who have planned a destination wedding!

I decided not to make them because I had heard too many horror stories of couples spending precious pre-wedding time delivering them, hotel front desk agents forgetting to distribute them, and guests dumping most of what's in them. Not everyone has these experiences, but the chance that any or all of these things might happen was enough to make me direct my time and budget to different areas of planning.

 

[insight blue]

I love the idea of welcome bags! Especially when guests travel so far, I just think it's an extra-special way of saying "Thank you for being here!" The majority of our welcome bags were used, but that's because about 80% was food/snack type items and mini water bottles. It also gave us a nice way to hand out a copy of our welcome letter with all the info for the weekend.

 

[YouLoveJulianne]

I am absolutely doing them, I didn't question it otherwise. Like Insight Blue said, it is a nice thank you and welcome to the people who have traveled all this way to be there for your wedding. All the weddings I have been at (locally, even) have had them if you stayed over at the hotel. However, I am cutting it off at only doing for the people who stay in our room blocks. This way there's only 3 hotels that we need to drop the bags off at.

 

[sarahb01]

I too am doing them without question. In fact the actual bags were the first wedding item I bought after I got engaged. I think it is really nice for your guests to get something, espically when they are traveling so far. I am pretty much skipping the favors at the wedding because of the welcome bag. I plan on putting in snacks and water, mickey soaps that I am making, maybe little sunscreens, welcome letter, park maps, I'm Celebrating buttons, door hanger, and maybe a beach towel, IF I can swing it. I am only planning on giving them to people that stay ON property. I have heard from other brides if you put on a card, with the reservation number, the front desk should have no problem getting it to them.

I know how excited I get when I get things like this

 

[sambycat]

for me, it was a fun project to keep me busy and i enjoyed it BUT i didnt do anything terribly fancy (simple bags, homemade info “brochure”, door hanger, candy, tissues, votive candle) and let me say that generally you (and other destination brides as carrie mentioned) will be WAY more into this then anyone else. and i only got involved as we were a relatively small wedding (32 total) AND i did one bag per “group”.

 

[ChocoKat]

I did the whole welcome bag thing.

I thought it would be a nice detail and tried my best to gather things overtime in order to help the budget.

I had the itinerary for the wedding, a thank you/welcome letter there along with travel essentials one might forget while packing but nothing bulky or that would be an issue to fly with and finally some Disney souvenirs (as in one or two souvenirs per bag).

I decided to make sure I didn't junk it up too much and that there were actual things I would take with me.

Our guests thanked us for the bags and really enjoyed getting them.
I will say this though: we didn't mind going around the resorts and dropping the bags, we had our own transportation and allotted time for this, so it was a breeze. We also made sure to have our guests reservation numbers clearly labeling the bags and we told everybody to ask for their welcome bag at check-in since, even thought they make a note, sometimes they won't bring it up without being prompted.

Thanks to a lot of lovely DIS brides I knew exactly what to do and looking back I would do it again without an issue.

 

[ShanaMouse]

i think welcome bags are a great idea, especially if you can find a way thats budget friendly. I think there will always be people or couples that look at the welcome bag and then pretty much disregard whatever is in it but most people will appreciate the gesture. I think if you put practical things into the bags you won't feel like you wasted money, such as a welcome letter, maybe water/snacks, sunscreen, flip flops, park maps, etc.

I also wrestled with the thought of yes or no but i think im going to do them because its also a nice little project to keep you busy and another element for you to "customize".

 

[inkedupmomma]

I'm very torn on these as well! I know the guests staying where we are getting married will def get their bags... but I worry about what Lurky said about the other place not handing them out....



I'm still trying to even come up with how to make them affordable!

 

[MickeysStarTrader]

I gotta be honest... As a guest, I love getting a welcome bag, but as a bride I skipped them, and nobody even noticed. I think really the only people who know to expect a welcome bag are those who have planned a destination wedding!

I decided not to make them because I had heard too many horror stories of couples spending precious pre-wedding time delivering them, hotel front desk agents forgetting to distribute them, and guests dumping most of what's in them. Not everyone has these experiences, but the chance that any or all of these things might happen was enough to make me direct my time and budget to different areas of planning.

Thanks lurkyloo! Saying that you love getting them makes me feel like I should do them I know no one would notice if I didn't, but I think I might feel at some point like I was doing the bare minimum for them after they've done so much to be at my wedding. I think I will just make sure what I put in them is useful to minimize the chance of it getting trashed.

I love the idea of welcome bags! Especially when guests travel so far, I just think it's an extra-special way of saying "Thank you for being here!" The majority of our welcome bags were used, but that's because about 80% was food/snack type items and mini water bottles. It also gave us a nice way to hand out a copy of our welcome letter with all the info for the weekend.

I definitely love the idea of welcome bags too! At first I thought "yes, definitely doing that!" because we thought we wouldn't get many people coming. Now we're inviting more people I'm still happy to do it but I will care more if 30 bags go in the trash rather than 10. I was planning on doing what you did and putting food items and water bottles in there along with our welcome info and itinerary.

I too am doing them without question. In fact the actual bags were the first wedding item I bought after I got engaged. I think it is really nice for your guests to get something, espically when they are traveling so far. I am pretty much skipping the favors at the wedding because of the welcome bag. I plan on putting in snacks and water, mickey soaps that I am making, maybe little sunscreens, welcome letter, park maps, I'm Celebrating buttons, door hanger, and maybe a beach towel, IF I can swing it. I am only planning on giving them to people that stay ON property. I have heard from other brides if you put on a card, with the reservation number, the front desk should have no problem getting it to them.

I know how excited I get when I get things like this

Sarah, you saying you get excited about welcome bags also makes me want to do them! You mentioned adding a lot of the things I was thinking about adding. All things that I would use myself which is what I think my guidelines will be. If I would toss/ignore it, don't put it in there

for me, it was a fun project to keep me busy and i enjoyed it BUT i didnt do anything terribly fancy (simple bags, homemade info “brochure”, door hanger, candy, tissues, votive candle) and let me say that generally you (and other destination brides as carrie mentioned) will be WAY more into this then anyone else. and i only got involved as we were a relatively small wedding (32 total) AND i did one bag per “group”.

Thanks sambycat! I would have loved receiving one of your welcome bags!

i think welcome bags are a great idea, especially if you can find a way thats budget friendly. I think there will always be people or couples that look at the welcome bag and then pretty much disregard whatever is in it but most people will appreciate the gesture. I think if you put practical things into the bags you won't feel like you wasted money, such as a welcome letter, maybe water/snacks, sunscreen, flip flops, park maps, etc.

I also wrestled with the thought of yes or no but i think im going to do them because its also a nice little project to keep you busy and another element for you to "customize".

I think you're right on the money Shana! That was really helpful input I think you're so right, there will probably always be at least one person who's unappreciative but I think most people will make use of the bags if I can stick to the contents being practical

I'm very torn on these as well! I know the guests staying where we are getting married will def get their bags... but I worry about what Lurky said about the other place not handing them out....

I'm still trying to even come up with how to make them affordable!

This is what I plan to do as far as handing them out goes: we're going to have a welcome event at my hotel room (we're going to use our DVC points to stay in a 2-bedroom villa) so I will hand out the welcome bags myself there and then. It won't be difficult because they'll all be in my room anyway. Perhaps if you're doing a welcome event or a rehearsal dinner, you could hand them out there yourself if it's not too much trouble? Then you know they'll make it. Otherwise, I think a previous poster mentioned some tricks to ensure they get to your guests on property

To make it affordable, depending on how many guests you're having, I have a couple of ideas: discountmugs.com and printglobe.com have some great stuff and it's really cheap if you're talking price per item, but you have to buy minimum quantities. Sometimes that's 50 sometimes it's as many as 200 depending what item it is. Might work out well if you have a lot of guests. We're not expecting to have that many guests so I'm going to use Oriental Trading for a lot of my stuff because you can buy by the dozen. I hope that wasn't completely useless info!

 

[Evi]

I'm doing them, I'm theming them to my wedding and doing one per guest. I am only inviting close family and a few friends and really would like to give them a little extra thank you for coming from so far away.

I've also started working on them now since I didn't want it to be forgotten about later.

I do think that its a personal choice but not required. If you don't want to o them don't. No one will notice.

 

[pezaddict231]

We did welcome bags and our guests really enjoyed them. The main reason we did it was because I needed to include a timeline of wedding events and when the buses would be picking them up from the resorts. As a guest I always like getting them and felt like it was a nice thing to do since everyone was coming from so far away. I kept the bags pretty simple and just stuck with some snacks, hand sanitizer, shout wipes, advil, bandaids, and then I got a few Disney themed things from the dollar store and the dollar section at Michaels. I think there were little markers and a notepad. I also included a folder with a timeline of wedding events, a hidden mickey guide, and a Disney tips sheet. I didn't think people would even read these things but so many people mentioned it. Most of the resorts were really good about giving out the bags. I heard that at Pop century they even delivered them to the rooms. Ironically, the only resort that did not give them out was CSR, which you would think as a convention resort would have experience with that sort of thing. I would just mention to your guests to ask for them when they check in. You can definitely do them pretty inexpensively and I think people really do appreciate it.

 

[JRoyster86]

What kind of bags did everyone use? I'm thinking of using the Disney reusable grocery bags they sell at the Disney Store. Or would it be better to use a canvas bag of some sort? I love the reusable bags and use them all the time so I would love to get an extra one.

 

[brinkley07]

I did them and the guests did love them. I put in all of the park brochures and time schedules(Disney and other parks), wedding itinerary and directions, a few snacks, small waters, hand sanitizer and wipes, and I think maps of the area. We were able to do them all very inexpensively, but everyone thought it was great because they all came in from out of town. All of the park stuff was free and we found free maps too. The snacks we bought in bulk from Sams or Walmart. We did leave them with the front desk, and they were all labeled with names so they were given upon arrival. We used small baskets so things were visible and easy to grab. Good luck!!

 

[sarahb01]

What kind of bags did everyone use? I'm thinking of using the Disney reusable grocery bags they sell at the Disney Store. Or would it be better to use a canvas bag of some sort? I love the reusable bags and use them all the time so I would love to get an extra one.

The reusable bags from the Disney Store is what I am using! I thought having a bag like that would be great for maybe a pool bag when they head to the pool at their resort. I bought some from a girl here on the DIS. So they are an older style, and bigger than the ones now. But I think the bag itself is also part of the "gift". I did think about using a gift bag, like throw away, and thought having the the reusable bag they could think of the great time they had at our wedding, because they will certainly get use when they go back home.

 

[Alifay]

What kind of bags did everyone use? I'm thinking of using the Disney reusable grocery bags they sell at the Disney Store. Or would it be better to use a canvas bag of some sort? I love the reusable bags and use them all the time so I would love to get an extra one.

Disney Store reuseable bags FOR THE WIN!!! If you can, order them *TODAY* they are having their friends and family special, 25% off your ENTIRE purchase but today is the last day! That is even better than the cast member discount

I scored 30 bags today that were already on sale for $1.99, 25% off made them $1.49 each!! What a steal I am so excited!


IMG_4022 by Alifay1, on Flickr

 

[serenityfire]

Those are the bags we're using too!

I love getting welcome bags when I go to weddings, so I definitely want to do them for ours. We are doing one per room for those who stay in our room block. I found some cute little Disney coloring books for a dollar at Walmart to put in the ones for people with kids.

I think if you start early, it's a fun project to collect items for them as you lead up to the wedding day.

 

[leelee9878]

What kind of bags did everyone use? I'm thinking of using the Disney reusable grocery bags they sell at the Disney Store. Or would it be better to use a canvas bag of some sort? I love the reusable bags and use them all the time so I would love to get an extra one.

Not sure if you ended up going this route or already purchased these but a lot of styles are on sale at disneystore.com for 1.99 and there is a 25% coupon code right now.