The Case for Not Feeding Wedding Vendors in 2026

We have seriously lost the plot when even the assistant to the fifth backup photographer is extorting the client in their contract for the same $150 VIP meal as the guests, to be served at an exact time — or they'll abandon ship for God knows how long at best, delete your wedding pictures at worst. But who's in the right? Wedding vendors who "legally" demand what practically feels like extortion to be fed, or clients who don't want to spend even more money on people who could easily pack their own lunch? And if you think I'm exaggerating about these people flat-out extorting you for food, you have none other than Brides publishing an open extortion letter, with The Knot and Junebug not even giving you the option to opt out of vendor meals. But this wasn't always the case. Let's go back ten years…

Wedding Vendors Can Pack Their Own Lunch

In January 2016, Brides published Which Vendors Do You Have to Feed at Your Wedding?, written by wedding planner Sandy Malone, in which she stated: "My general rule is that if you're working just the wedding itself, feed yourself or pack a lunch to eat in the staff break area if you cannot survive the shift." And of course, wedding vendors specifically wedding photographers, lost their collective shit so hard that Brides had no choice but to delete the article. But it thankfully lives on in the Wayback Machine. And I bring this up to show that I didn't dig this concept out of my ass — because it was once the public stance of the wedding industry itself. And I wish it would have stayed, but here we are, with wedding vendor entitlement to the max.

Wedding Photographers Have No Qualm Calling You A Broke Ass

Not gonna lie, I agreed with the tiki-torch mob at first. But over the years, after photographing weddings of all scales, dealing with ass-wipe vendors, photographers, and planners, and seeing countless videos of wedding vendors — specifically wedding photographers — calling out their own clients for being broke asses for feeding them a bootleg sandwich, I've grown to not only appreciate what was said in that Brides article, but now find myself telling you, the client, the check writer, to not only stop tipping your wedding vendors, but also not bother feeding them the same $150 meal.

Not to mention that most wedding vendors, for all the preaching they do on their websites about your story, details matter, and putting the client experience first, fail to realize that you naturally come up with logical questions like: Do wedding vendors get meals? Why is feeding wedding vendors necessary? And do vendors count as wedding guests? After realizing that, not only do you have to pay these people thousands of dollars to show up to your wedding — and probably tip them too — but you also have to feed them a fancy-ass lunch!

Matter a fact, in the comment section on a recent BuzzFeed article titled Feeding Wedding Vendors Shouldn't Be Required, one wedding photographer said: "It's honestly why Trump is as popular as he is and why he got elected." Another wedding photographer said, "In the USA, we call them Republicans. These are the ghouls you're looking for." All because you, the client, dared to ask the aforementioned questions. Mind you, these are the motherfuckers who preach about "love trumps hate" and "everyone is safe here" on their websites.

Most Wedding Vendor Meals Suck Swamp Ass

Meal options for the hired help… I mean the wedding vendor crew… come in a variety of flavors and are almost never included in your initial catering quote or proposal. Hence why clients then jump to the internet dot com to ask why, only to be bombarded by 3,000 keyboard warriors — the very reason we're here talking about it now. And no matter which option you end up choosing, they're all cleverly designed by the venue and or catering company to fuck you in the ass, no lube. Now keep in mind, as with anything in the wedding industry, nothing is standardized, meaning prices for vendor meals can range from (rarely) being included to $175 on the high end. So check with your caterer and venue to avoid sticker shock. Those options being, with average cost:

The Box Lunch | $50

This notorious option usually has a cold-cut sandwich no mayo, an apple, and maybe a cookie if they remembered to slip it inside the brown cardboard box. And was probably slapped together the night before. This option is by far the primary reason wedding vendor entitlement to getting the same meal as your guests gained so much traction in the community to the point of adding, "I want a hot meal" in contracts. And to be honest, this option is really not that bad, especially for vendors who don't eat at weddings. What sucks for you however, is the fact that this depressing excuse for a lunch usually costs fifty fucking dollars! Gets clowned on social media, and often gets thrown in the trash.

Buffet Vendor Meal | $30-$75

By far the worst option for vendors, since whatever is left — assuming anything is left — is what the vendors eat. As we say in Spanish, ya está todo manoseado. Price-wise, it's about the same as what you'd pay for your guests, so this actually benefits you since it won't cost you that much extra to add a few more people to the headcount.

Venue Vendor Meal | $35-$95

Sometimes the vendor meal is provided by the venue itself, either through in-house catering or an in-house restaurant. This meal is usually different from what your guests eat consisting of cold French fries, cold fried chicken, and, if we're lucky, cold onion soup too. And not gonna lie, most vendors don't bother touching it. Money down the drain, food in the trash.

Catering Vendor Meal | 50% of a Guest Meal Price

This option is by far the most common and is provided by your caterer at half the cost of your guests' meals, as the vendors usually — keyword usually — get the same meal, a smaller portion of it, or a different meal altogether. However, this meal is also not safe from being enjoyed cold, because 95% of holier-than-thou caterers insist on serving the vendors dead last, like the hired help they are.

Why the Expensive Vendor Meal Ends Up in the Trash

Notice how I kept bringing up the fact that the food is always cold. So maybe it's safe to say that's the reason wedding vendors — specifically photographers — started adding in their contracts to get a hot meal at a specific time. Because we usually don't get to sit down and eat until dancing starts late into the night and when and if we do, we have five minutes to eat it if we're lucky, the food never gets touched if we're not. But see, that's why I argue it's better for the client to not even bother with expensive, often cold vendor meals and instead slip us a fifty to buy something afterward. But I get it — that's not always possible.

Because even if the client goes above and beyond for their vendors by paying for the same meal as their guests, there is still no guarantee the vendors will get said hot meal, especially at a massive wedding. And this happens more often than you think, wedding planners have reported receiving the notorious box lunch even when the full hot meal was paid for. And who is seen as the bad guy then? You, of course.

So what's the solution to all this? Well, I'd start with having a small wedding, or hosting your reception at a restaurant. Because! Another thing not openly talked about is how wedding food is kinda mid. Any down-to-earth vendor will tell you wedding food is wedding food — nothing new under the sun. It's always a slab of bland beef or undercooked chicken breast drowned in a cold cream sauce that'll give anyone explosive diarrhea in two minutes flat.

So unless you book a caterer who is known for — or specializes in — one or two dishes tops, you're more than likely getting standard-issue wedding food. Which again, most vendors don't bother with, not out of ungratefulness at that point, but because it's nothing worth getting sick over. Which is why I argue that you shouldn't bother spending your hard earned money on standard vendor meals because...

Not Everyone Gets a Meal: A Stupid Made-Up Rule

So not only do you have to worry about everything else involved in planning a wedding, you now have to worry about who gets food and who doesn't. And I'm sure you're kind-hearted and assume that everyone present helping put together your expensive wedding will get fed at some point — but nope, not the case. Leave it to the wedding "experts" to dictate who gets iced out of even a depressing lunch.

A quick search on the googles about who gets a vendor meal at your wedding will show you the exact same bullshit they made up for tipping: only so-called VIP vendors get a tip and food, and only if they're there for more than five hours — but not four hours and fifty-nine minutes. Oh no. At that point, they can go fuck themselves.

At a recent celebrity-adjacent wedding I photographed, we were given the notorious box lunch. I'll admit, I don't care what we get because I work best on an empty stomach — granted the client allows me to drink on the job. Unfortunately, this venue had a dumb-ass rule of no vendors drinking, but I caught the DJ multiple times getting slipped drinks throughout the night. Whatever. When our break finally rolled around, the planner presented me with the box lunch while I was talking to the photo booth guy. I asked her, "Is he not getting one?" She said no, because he wasn't there for more than five hours. I was like, okay, but he's here now. I'm not going to eat in front of him — just give him my box. She said no, it's not transferable. WHAT!? Brah! It's a raggedy-ass tuna wrap. It ain't that deep. Just give him the damn box. She kept refusing. So what happened to that lunch? It went in the trash.

As comical as it sounds, you'd be surprised how often this happens without you knowing. And that's even after with good intentions, you paid an additional $1,800 for your vendors to eat — only to lose control once rigid, stupid, made-up wedding rules take over. So I understand why vendors started adding something as basic as food into their contracts. What I won't accept however, is vendors blaming clients for it, even calling you a right-wing extremist, because no matter how thoughtfully you planned your wedding, you can't be in all places at once making sure everything gets executed as intended. And if you don't actively question how vendor meals are handled, you could be paying a lot of money and still end up looking like the wicked stepmother in Cinderella. Which finally brings us to…

A Practical Alternative to the $150 Wedding Vendor Meal

To be absolutely crystal clear, I am not saying DO NOT feed wedding vendors. What I am saying is do NOT go over budget on bootleg $50 chopped sandwiches or, overpriced $75–$150 cold vendor meals that at best, are scarfed down in two minutes, end up in the trash at worst. Having experienced all vendor meal options across every wedding size and scale, and seeing how my clients have planned their own weddings, I've found that the best practical solution — one that keeps vendors happily well-fed throughout the day and, more importantly, makes the most financial sense — is following the three-prong approach my clients have implemented at their weddings.

First: set up a craft table with random snacks so vendors can grab and go throughout the day, allowing vendors who are there for setup only to also have something to snack on. You can include things like granola bars, chips, trail mix, fruit, cookies, bottled water, soda/juice, maybe even small sandwiches. A basic table covers 5-10 vendors for under $100 easy.
Second: order extra hors d'oeuvres so vendors can grab something hot midway through during cocktail hour. This often comes at no extra cost if you already planned hors d'oeuvres for guests — just make sure you order a few extra portions for vendors. An extra $80 tops.
And finally: have a roach coach taco truck shoot through to guarantee that any vendor still lurking, twerking but not working, gets a hot meal whenever they see fit. It can be tacos, In-N-Out, sandwiches, pizza, or any similar quick-serve option for both guests and vendors midway through or toward the end of the night. If you already planned a late-night truck for guests, the marginal cost for vendors is often zero.

Think about it: if you're already planning on bringing food later in the night, and knowing that at least a quarter of guests leave after an hour of dancing, then the vendors technically eat for free if you've already paid for the total guest count. Vendors get a made-to-order hot meal and can even take some food for the road — all without costing you anything extra if you were already planning on having a roach coach post up. And no, the fact that this option doesn't fully solve the issue of vendors still having to eat late has not gone over my head. But again, you compensate by ordering extra hors d'oeuvres during cocktail hour for your vendors to snack on. And if you want to go the extra mile, set up the little craft table somewhere with individually wrapped treats, lemonade, and water. But don't take my word for it — run the numbers yourself. You'll see that this approach is typically 60%–80% cheaper than spending $750–$1,800 on traditional formal vendor meals.

You Set It And!?… Forget It!

Best of all, this trifecta model reduces wedding planner micromanagement, if handled correctly, by removing the following from their plate (no pun intended): tracking who gets to eat and who doesn't, illogical service timing, mah contract says hot meal drama, and seating-chart logistics. All while simultaneously turning vendor meals into self-service with flexible windows and cutting caterer coordination down to a simplified "add extra apps at cocktail hour and late-night roach coach confirmed," with fewer timeline choke points overall. It's a radical but practical shift from outdated ceremonial meals to functional nourishment, because the current system is broken on all sides:

Clients pay a ton → feel resentful
Vendors get fed late or cold → feel disrespected
Planners referee food drama → lose time and sanity
Caterers profit off inefficient add-ons → everyone else loses

This model quietly, and effectively fixes all four needless headaches at once by feeding more people, more often, with less waste, with fewer rules, at a much lower cost. And even if after all this, people are still bitching about mah contract says, mah keto diet this, my Weight Watchers plan that. Then you know what!? Bye, Felicia! As the homegirl Sandy Malone said, "this is not a job for a wimp." So you can tell that vendor I said: that's a you problem, gang! You're being paid to provide a professional service — not to show up to day care with a scheduled sippy cup snack and nap time.

If they can't handle it, they can go back to their 9–5. Wedding vendors are a dime a dozen in 2026. You have the pick of the litter my friend.

Because if a vendor's ability to function hinges on a client-provided plated meal at a precise time, then what's being demanded is not simple nourishment — it's control and expectation creep hiding behind joyful slogans. Yes, medical conditions exist, allergies are real, and some vendors truly need timely nutrition — but that is each grown-ass adult's responsibility to manage, not the client's. Nothing is stopping any one vendor from saying no to a so-called cheapskate client, because a true professional is self-sufficient, and plans for late timelines with cold food. Showing up fully prepared, even if it means packing your own lunch, is not beneath professionalism — it is professionalism.