Birthday dinner invitation question

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the helpful responses! I'm sure I was defensive in my replies....I'm trying to help my close friend's husband plan a nice evening for her and no one wants to be called tacky.

The "invitation" was going to be a quick email or e-vite, nothing fancy.

While I would love to treat everyone to a great meal with cocktails, it isn't in my budget. It isn't in her budget either, and her tiny 1 bedroom apartment isn't the best place for a group this size to hang out and eat. Just trying to work with what we have.

[Anonymous]

She is hosting a cocktail party followed by a dutch treat dinner that she is organizing. This is fine. An invitation is fine as long as that is clear. I might word it something like this:

Please join us for cocktails (and appetizers??) to celebrate X's birthday.

date:
time:
location:

RSVP: phone number/email

At 7pm we will leave for a dinner at XX (link to menu). Let me know if you'd like to join (dutch treat) so I can include you in the reservation.

[Anonymous]

Do not say "Dutch treat." It's kind of offensive, so perhaps say that each pays her own way.

[Anonymous]

Just invite them for cocktails and then tell everyone that some of you plan to go to dinner afterwards, and they are welcome to come along as well.
Don't put anything about dinner on the invite.

[Anonymous]

I have no advice, but seriously, who can afford to take a group of their friends out to dinner? I'm glad I have the friends I do because we all know when we go out to dinner we pay our own way. No free rides here, and no one has or had daddy's credit card!
If they can't figure out that you didn't say, we would like to take everyone to dinner, then they are the ones being tacky!

[Anonymous]

Simple, send an invitation for the cocktail party only. Then call or email each person individually and mention the pay your own way dinner after.

[Anonymous]

Or have a smaller group of people that her hubby and you can afford to spring for the meal.

[Anonymous]

OP,
The birthday girl is paying for herself, too?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How do I word the invitation so people know what to expect?

Will be having a dozen or so people over to my place for cocktails to celebrate a friend's birthday, then we're all going to dinner. But each person will be paying for their own dinner. Will include name of restaurant so they can look at menu & pricing ahead of time. They're of course welcome to just come for the cocktails part of the evening.

Will people assume that the cost of meal is individual? We're in our 20's and a mix of singles and married.

People will assume that if you are INVITING them to a dinner party, that you will be treating.

If you can't afford to treat, then do something else.

[Anonymous]

This is totally normal situation, nothing tacky about it. We still do drinks and then split dinner (treating the birthday person), and we're in our 30s and 40s. No big deal, is standard for someone's birthday.

[Anonymous]

OP, it's not tacky to be in your 20's, want to help celebrate a friend's birthday, and expect all the friends to pay for themselves. This is normal. All of my friends did this throughout their 20's and still do it. Or maybe both you and me are tacky, OP, who knows? I'd send out an email saying "We're getting together to take so and so out for his birthday. Please let us know if you'd like to join us. I'll be hosting cocktails at my house ahead of time." Include a link to the menu. I never assumed that a friend who invited me to a mutual friend's birthday party at a restaurant was going to pay for the whole thing. I assumed I'd pay for myself plus chip in for the birthday girl/guy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP,
The birthday girl is paying for herself, too?

OP here.
No! The birthday girl will absolutely not pay for herself. Most of the people invited would never dream of letting her pay.

For everyone telling me that if I can't afford to pay for everyone then I should pick something else:
I appreciate your input. If you would kindly email me your credit card information, I would be MORE than happy to charge up the dinner & drinks bill. I'm estimating that it will be around $600. Not a big deal though, right?

And for those curious: I didn't pick the restaurant. My friend's husband did. The menu looks delicious, and they were one of the few places willing to let a group our size eat dinner without paying for a private room.

[Anonymous]

Amen, 17:20. What the hell is wrong with everyone on here? Throughout my 20s, and even now that I'm in my mid-30s, I regularly was invited to birthday dinners for friends. I never once considered that the person organizing the event was paying for all of us!! We always pay for the birthday girl or boy but then we each pay our own way. We do usually split the bill evenly, which means I'm paying for my friend who consumes 3x more booze than me, but I know that going into the dinner and have learned to just suck it up. And for clarification, we are all highly paid professionals with good manners.

OP, the responses you are getting here are in no way reflective of the way the rest of the world thinks about this subject. Good lord. Enjoy your dinner and don't stress that your friends will assume you are paying or will consider it rude if you don't. They won't. 17:20's wording is perfect.

[Anonymous]

I agree. I think you should let it be known somehow that each is paying their own way for dinner, but no one will think twice about it. Perhaps add something like, Resteraunt X will gladly provide individual bills upon request. (if they agree to do that) it let's them know each person is on their own. Have a great time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Amen, 17:20. What the hell is wrong with everyone on here? Throughout my 20s, and even now that I'm in my mid-30s, I regularly was invited to birthday dinners for friends. I never once considered that the person organizing the event was paying for all of us!! We always pay for the birthday girl or boy but then we each pay our own way. We do usually split the bill evenly, which means I'm paying for my friend who consumes 3x more booze than me, but I know that going into the dinner and have learned to just suck it up. And for clarification, we are all highly paid professionals with good manners.

OP, the responses you are getting here are in no way reflective of the way the rest of the world thinks about this subject. Good lord. Enjoy your dinner and don't stress that your friends will assume you are paying or will consider it rude if you don't. They won't. 17:20's wording is perfect.

I already posted that it is rude to invite people to pay for an event. When I was in my 20s, we had large groups go out an pay for big birthday dinners themselves all the time. But - and this is the crucial distinction - we did not "invite" them to dinner. One person took on the role of organizing something, and we all pitched in. It is not the same thing as inviting people to dinner.