How To Say No To Friends and Family Offering Wedding Services

When you announce your engagement and start planning your wedding, you may have family and friends who approach you offering their services for your wedding day. It may be a friend who is good at organizing social events and parties or has put together a few baby showers and wants to try their hand at planning a wedding. Or, it may be a cousin who recently got into photography and has purchased their first semi-professional camera and offers to photograph your wedding for the experience.

You are eternally grateful for them wanting to help but the problem is, you know that planning a social event or baby shower for 30-40 people is a lot different than planning a wedding. And the cousin with the new camera wanting to gain some wedding experience, maybe they are a descent photographer, but they’ve never shot a wedding before. Although you’ll love to give these people an opportunity, you have a specific vision for your wedding day and you’d like to play it safe and utilize the professionals who already have a proven track record.

But, how do you politely decline their help in a way that doesn’t offend them? This can be especially difficult when you have other family members pushing you to use their services because, “they’re family”.

There are a few ways to go about saying “NO” without damaging any relationships with your family and/or friends who want to be vendors for your wedding.

Ways to Say No!

If this is the first time being asked, you can send a polite email or text that reads something like this:

“We appreciate you being so gracious and volunteering to help with our wedding, however we would love for you to just come and enjoy our wedding as a guest and not have to worry or stress over the wedding planning details.”

“Thank you so much for offering to help but we already have it taken care of. We can’t wait to see you at the wedding.”

“We really appreciate your offer, however we have already secured all of our wedding vendors. We can’t wait to celebrate with you at the reception.”

However, if the person(s) are being presentant, even after telling them politely that you don’t need their services, you’ll want to take a more direct approach. You can say something like:

“We have decided that we would much rather have our loved ones participate as guests, so we will not be using any family or friends as wedding vendors.”

Although, direct and to the point, you are still being polite and keeping it positive.

If the person is someone you never intended to invite to the wedding there is no need to include any detail in your response. You can keep your response short, direct, and to the point.

“Thank you but we already have everything covered.”

You are closing the topic and telling them that you do not need or want their services.

I would advise NOT to ignore someone’s offer or string them along with no intentions on using their services. This can definitely sour the relationship. It goes without saying, ignoring people is just flat out rude and stringing people along is highly inconsiderate of their’ time.

If you have family or friends who are anything like mine, then there will be some that love you so much that they just have to help with something. In this case you should assign them a small task, if you believe they are capable of properly executing it. This will allow them to feel like they played a role in your wedding, but without having the stress of something going horribly wrong on the big day. So, that friend who loves organizing social events/parties, ask them to organize your bridal shower or bachelorette party. For the cousin who is somewhat new to photography, maybe allow them to take a second set of engagement pictures or photograph your bridal shower.

Remember, the people who love you are excited for you and have good intentions and want to help make your journey to the altar and your wedding day a success. This doesn’t mean you have to give in. When it comes to planning your wedding you are allowed to be selfish, you are allowed to tell people exactly what you want and how you want it executed. You are allowed to say “no” to the things you don’t want or feel comfortable with. At the end of the day this is your wedding day and all that matters is what you want. You don’t have to be mean, but definitely be assertive. Trust me, it’s better to say “no” than to be pressured into saying “yes” and regretting your decision or even worse, ruining a relationship.

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