Group Trip for Guests

[sportsdog2]

Hi everyone:

 

I am planning a group trip for about 25 guests and would like to know how others have handled their arrangements. Did you pay for the transportation and the entrance fees? Or, just the transportation? I am working with Lee's Tours and Travel in Jamaica and found a tour for $15 per person. The entrance fees will be another $15 - $30 per person depending on where we go. The cost really adds up for 25 people. I'd like to do a group trip, but do not know if it is tacky to split the cost? If you did split the cost or are planning on splitting the cost, how did you inform your guests? I decided on the excursion based on what my guests said they would like to do. I presented the group trip as optional without any mention of cost. Your thoughts/comments are much appreciated.

[holstang]

What I did is plan a couple of excursions that I knew would be crowd pleasers, and then forwarded all the information to them, so they could book it on their own if they were interested. This way, no one feels obligated to go, since it is THEIR vacation as well, and you won't feel bad and be out of money if someone flakes out. Just a suggestion, and that way you have one less thing to plan!

[Geralyn]

We just told everyone when we were down there that we were planning on doing the cool running/dunn's river falls excursion on a certain day...whoever wanted to come did (they paid for themselves) We had 25 out of 43 people come....we had such a great time!

[sportsdog2]

Thanks for your responses. Since I have not received much response from my guests, I'm leaning toward sending information from Lee's and having everyone book their own trips. How did you arrange the trips? Did you have to pay a deposit? Did you have to give the tour company the exact number of guests?

[budgetjamaicabride]

We told everyone on our website and will put more info in the brochure I am sending out a month before that we will be doing a trip first thing Sunday morning. I have made it an optional thing and told them how to make arrangements to join us. They can book when they arrive. Completely optional

[Tilly in the Sun]

I went to a DW last November where the couple just told everyone they would be taking the catamaran tour on the Friday (the day before everyone was leaving), and whoever was welcome to join them could. About 22 of 46 of us went on the tour and we each paid our own way and had a blast! Like what has already been mentioned, for a lot of guests they are using it as their vacation time so they can do as much or as little as they want (outside of the wedding day of course).

When we go down my FI is taking a day to golf and inviting any one who wants to come (again to pay their own way), while the same day I will go to the spa and again give the open invite. We will most likely do the catamaran trip again as well. I plan to post all of info on our wedding website and spread the info by word of mouth.

[Brenda&Jeff09]

We booked a private sunset cruise for after the wedding & dinner... but that's really more part of our Mexico reception, so we're paying for it. Some of our guests have asked about deep sea fishing and things like that, and instead of booking it and paying for it, I'm sending out a pre-trip newsletter and I'll include all of "extras" that are offered through the resort. That way they know what's available and they can book it & pay for it themselves if they decide to do it... that way it's still their vacation too, and I'm not planning the whole thing for them.

[JCruz]

We're also going to do a sunset cruise for our guests that we're paying for. We're organizing it as a thank-you for coming all the way to Mexico with us. However, we're looking at organzing a couple of other excursions such as deep-sea fishing and snorkling which is optional and we are not paying for.