I’ll be getting married in two weeks, which is super exciting, but my guy & I need a bit of advice on tipping.
We have, currently, only two kinds of vendors. A photographer who is family & giving us a family rate, and the caterers. We aren’t doing flowers or video or anything else.
I don’t imagine I’m supposed to tip the photographer, based on the idea that you don’t tip the owner of a business, since they set the rates. However, if I’m wrong, I’d really rather hear that from you guys than be a jackass to family.
The caterers, I know I’m supposed to tip. I don’t know how much, and what to base it on (just the food, total bill, more than the food but less than the total?). Any advice on that would be fabulous.
Then there’s the bartender. The bartender is being provided by the caterers for 5 hours. It is an open bar, but beer & wine only. We are supplying the alcohol, not purchased from the caterer. My guy & I have discussed two possible scenarios, but don’t know how much to tip in either case.
The bartender has a tip jar out & our guests tip him based on their drinks. I’m sure we should tip above this amount, but how much?
We tell the bartender “We’ve got you” and there’s no tip jar. Assuming we go this route, what’s the proper amount to tip? The few friends we’ve asked have said anywhere from 10 - 20% of the alcohol amount, but they seem to be assuming we’re buying from the caterer. Furthermore, even if they aren’t, all the beer is homebrew (a gift from a friend), so the costs will be fairly low.
There’s one other potential vendor - we’re looking at getting a shuttle between the hotel & the wedding site. If we were to do this, how much would we tip the driver?
First of all, congratulations! Hooray for weddings!
For the photographer, if he’s family, I’d do a small gift of thanks with a handwritten note. Maybe a bottle of wine or something along those lines.
I can’t help you with the caterer or bartender, because the gratuity costs were rolled into the fee we paid and we didn’t go beyond that. If the bartender is provided by the caterer, I’d probably lump him in with whatever I tipped the caterers, but maybe I’m gauche on that front. I’d probably go with a tip jar, based on your scenario, but I’m no etiquette expert.
I’ve also never had a shuttle that wasn’t provided by the hotel free of charge, so I’m not sure how that works.
No tip jar, please!! As far as I’m concerned, that’s beyond tacky. When my folks did their 50th anniversary, they told the bartender up front there would be no jar and that they’d be covering the gratuity. (Not sure why that was required above and beyond what he as being paid, but that’s what they did.)
You might just ask the caterers how people typically handle tips - obviously they’d know. Same for the shuttle driver.
I do agree that a gift and a note would be a very nice gesture for the family member/photographer.
FairyChatMom, we’re definitely feeling that a tip jar is not the way we want to go, but it’s commonplace in our circles. We’ve never blinked at one when we’ve gone to weddings, but we know we’d feel inhospitable if there was a tip jar out. Which is weird, because I doubt anyone would blink if we had one out!
That said, we haven’t a clue what would be collected in a tip jar (the common method), so we don’t want to undertip if we say “We’ll take care of you”. Hence the concern.
Related, but not exactly, I have heard that couples have agreed to take care of the tips & had a tip jar come out anyway. That, I figure, may or may not happen, but I’ll have parents & attendants paying attention for that, and if it does happen, they’ll have a word with the bartender. Of course, this would negatively impact how much I’d want to tip, but how much would you deduct if this occurred?
Tipping is confusing outside of normal “eating at a restaurant”.
ETA: Thanks for the suggestions, Antigen. A gift for our photographer is a good idea. I’m not sure what, but I am sure we can manage a something.
Just want to add that “Party Down” has a running joke about tip jars vs flat tips for their catering services at events. The tip jars never go well for them.
We had a similar setup to yours - buffet dinner, and the caterer provided a bartender to serve alcohol we had purchased purchased elsewhere. As insane as it sounds, I think we tipped 15% of the total catering bill, which ended up being something like $125 per catering staff person for the evening. But when you think about it, they spent something like 7 hours on site, not counting prep or travel time. And everyone thought they were fabulous.
Well how else do you think that a server would be compensated? Are you really baffled? At the rate of 2.13 per hour either the host will pay a flat rate in service to compensate the server or bartender or the guests will tip in a tip jar. If the OP is opposed to a tip jar then a flat fee is fair. It is not rocket science to understand that no matter if you agree with it or not, tipping is a part of our culture and the food & wine/hospitality industry.
CitizenPained, I think keturah is basically right.
I expect the tips to the caterers & bartender to go to them at the end of the day, as with the gift to our photographer. This means that service can impact the tip, but it’s not going to be likely to drop it dramatically. I do know that if we go the route of telling the bartender “no tip jar” & we see a tip jar come out, I’m going to be peeved (and it may impact what’s in the envelope), but I don’t expect that to happen.