Four Steps to Choosing Wedding Day Favors

Wedding favors are children’s party favors’ sophisticated cousins and are often given as tokens of appreciation to wedding guests at some point during the wedding reception. Back in the old days-aka when I was growing up-my mom used to look for her color-coordinated book of matches and take an embossed cocktail napkin home as a souvenir from the couple’s happy day.

My, how things have changed.

Somewhere along the way, Americans followed the lead of French and Italian aristocrats who gave their guests bomboniere, a small porcelain or metal box filled with candied almonds and voila … the wedding favor was born.

Today’s bride has limitless options, from frames to homemade cookies to imported bottles of miniature olive oil (that’s what I gave!)-your imagination really *is* your only limitation. Need some help with that imagination?


Well here you go. Open a new browser, bride-to-be, because today we are going to choose your wedding favors!

Step 1:
If you haven’t already, you should start by familiarizing yourself with your options.

My Wedding Favors
This is the go-to site for wedding favor inspiration with categories divided by season, price, type and a special *featured favor* section. If it is wedding favor-related, you will find it here.

Wedding Favors
Yet another website dedicated to favors, this site features a “New for 2009” landing page, offers accessories for other wedding-related needs and even ships overseas. Another great place to get inspired.

Wedding Chicks
If you are planning a wedding and haven’t visited Wedding Chicks, then you are behind, girl. This site is a great meeting place for brides and features “real bride” bloggers, destination wedding advice and tips for weddings in each of the 50 states in the US.

Wedding Bee
Another must-see site for brides-to-be, Wedding Bee offers Pro Tips, a forum of other brides and photo galleries and classifieds.

Step 2:
Think about you, your fiance and your wedding theme and try to narrow your options. For example, if you and your honey met while salsa dancing, consider giving a salsa CD; if you are having an Asian-themed wedding, think about giving Asian fans; if you and your husband-to-be are actively involved in a charitable organization, you can give a donation to that organization in your guests’ names.


Step 3:
Set your budget-and stick to it! Favors can get out of control and can make you miss your budget mark by thousands of dollars. Since you have already reviewed your options, look at your budget and decide how much you can afford to spend per person. If you fall in love with an expensive option, brainstorm ways to make them yourself or search for less-expensive ways to create the favors yourself.

Step 4:
Decide at this point if you want to do something traditional or if you prefer to give a unique favor. When I got married, I knew that I wanted something different-or I wanted nothing at all. Since my husband is Italian and he and I live in the bel paese, we imported Italian olive oil, bottled it into miniature bottles for our guests, sealed the bottles and applied our own labels and raffia. Everyone raved about them and they looked like they cost much more than they actually did.

If you want to go a more traditional route, you can purchase chocolate bars and create your own labels online. American Greetings has candy wrappers you can easily create or you can visit favorideas.com for more ideas.

Have you chosen your favors? What are you giving? Are you making them or purchasing them pre-made?

Photos courtesy of Creative Abubot, Fairy Tale and Corey Ann