I planned my best friend Riley’s bachelorette weekend this past August. Fourteen of us, three days in Traverse City, Michigan, a honey theme, and a party bus to three wineries.
It was one of my favorite weekends ever. It was also about eight months of work, and almost none of that work was the fun part. The fun part is the theme. The hard part is fourteen people, everyone’s budget, and being the person who has to say the number out loud.
Here’s exactly what I did and when, including the parts nobody warns you about.
8 months out: talk to the bride, then send the number
Start with three questions, and ask the bride all of them before you look at a single Airbnb:
- When does she want it?
- What does she actually want to do?
- Who does she want there?
Then the two of you look at places together. Once you’ve found one, have the bride start the group chat, not you. It lands differently coming from her, and it saves you from introducing yourself to eleven people you’ve never met.
That first message should say where, when, what the place costs per person, and what else people should expect to pay for. Transportation, dinners, a bus, matching pajamas. All of it, even as a rough range.
This is the awkward part, and the only way through it is to be blunt about money as early as possible. Every bit of vagueness now becomes a much worse conversation in six months.
We sent that text about eight months out. Everyone said yes, and we booked.
Book as early as you possibly can. I’d also lean toward an Airbnb over a hotel block for this: you usually get months of free cancellation, which is a real safety net when you’re committing to a big house before anyone has paid you a cent.
6 months out: the email
Once it’s booked, send a proper email, not another text buried in the chat. Mine had:
- The link to the house we booked
- A tentative itinerary
- The official price for the winery party bus, now that I had a real quote
And then the important line: if this doesn’t work for you, tell me now.
Give people a genuine, low-shame exit while it’s still six months out and nothing is paid for. It is so much better than someone dropping out in month seven because the cost crept up on them.
4 months out: the theme, the lookbook, and removing the bride
This is where it gets fun. I built a Canva deck with:
- The theme: ours was “She Found Her Hunny,” honey and bees, everything yellow
- The full itinerary
- A lookbook so everyone knew what to wear each day
This is also when I removed Riley from the group chat. Not to be sneaky. I just wanted the whole thing to be a surprise, and I didn’t want her worrying about logistics for her own party. She got a separate chat with me. Everything else happened without her.
Same week, I sent a Google Form asking for:
- Shirt/pajama sizes (if you’re doing anything matching)
- Whether they’re willing to pitch in for decorations and groceries
- Any allergies or dietary restrictions
One form, one time, no chasing people individually. Do this before you buy anything.
2 to 4 months out: start buying
Shipping is the thing that ruins plans. I started ordering at about four months and kept going, so that anything slow had time to show up.
I bought across Temu, Shein, Amazon and Etsy depending on what got me the most for the money. A lot of bachelorette decor is genuinely disposable, and I wasn’t precious about it. The exceptions were anything custom or personalized, which I ordered first and from Etsy, because those have the longest lead times and are the most painful to have arrive late.
The two things that got the biggest reaction, for almost no money:
- Temporary tattoos with the groom’s face on them
- The groom’s face on a stick: we had these everywhere all weekend, and they’re in every single photo
Both are cheap, ridiculous, and the highest-return items of the entire weekend. Order anything custom first. It has the longest lead time and it’s the most painful thing to have arrive late.
I also set up a bride bag and bed setup for Riley to find when she arrived: matching pajamas, a “bride” hat, a sash, a little tote. Photograph that before anyone touches it.
1 month out: the spreadsheet
One month out I sent a spreadsheet with every cost broken out per person. Not a vague total. Line items.
The two big ones were the house and the winery party bus. Those scale with your group and your destination, so yours will look nothing like mine. It’s the small shared costs people forget to account for, so spell those out too:
| What | Cost per person |
|---|---|
| The house | split by headcount |
| Winery party bus | split by headcount |
| Matching pajamas | $12.94 |
| Decorations | $13.91 |
| Groceries | TBD |
Two things made this work:
Listing groceries as “TBD” instead of guessing. Nobody minds an honest TBD. Everybody minds a number that turns out to be wrong.
Collecting for pajamas and decorations up front. I ended up buying more decorations after I’d already sent that spreadsheet, and because everyone had chipped in, I wasn’t quietly absorbing all of it myself. Planning already costs you your time, and it shouldn’t also cost you the most money.
Extras: the part she’ll actually remember
Here’s the thing I most want you to take from this. The big-ticket items were not what she loved most. The wineries were great. The bus was great. But what she talked about was the small stuff that was obviously about her.
So think hard about what the bride actually likes, and then build something around each thing:
- She loves sweets → we did a candy salad, custom cake pops, and a sweets table with a sign that read Love is Sweet, Take a Treat
- She loves spritzes → we set up a full spritz bar with her favorite drinks
- She loves games → I made Kahoots about her and Hunter, plus a bar scavenger hunt for Saturday night
I also asked everyone to send me photos of themselves with the bride ahead of time, printed them, and built a photo wall. And one of the girls coming was artistic, so she painted the main banner. If you have a person like that in the group, use them.
None of that is expensive. All of it is specific.
The explicit stuff
I’ll keep this brief: the bachelorette-party novelty items were the biggest hit of the weekend. The ring toss game and a blow-up doll with the groom’s face taped on it got more laughs than anything else we did.
Read the room on this one. It depends entirely on your bride and who’s coming, including whether moms and future mothers-in-law are there. Ours loved it.
1 week out: the reminder
Send one final message with:
- The full itinerary, again
- What to pack, including the dress code for each day
- What time to arrive, and the address
Answer the questions before people ask them. Then add the bride back to the group chat.
During the weekend: you are the help desk
Nobody tells you this part. From the moment people arrive, you are the point of contact for everything. What time are we leaving, where are we eating, which bar next, where’s the charger, whose car are we taking.
Be ready for it. It’s genuinely fine. You built the plan, you’re the one who knows.
But here’s the answer I used constantly, and it’s the best piece of advice in this whole post:
“Whatever the bride wants.”
When everyone at the bar was asking me where we were going next, I didn’t actually want to be the one deciding. It’s her weekend. Handing the decision back to her took the pressure off me and made the night hers, which is the entire point.
If you only do four things
- Have the bride send the first text, and put the real numbers in it.
- Ask about money early, in writing, with an easy way to opt out.
- Collect for shared costs up front so you’re not silently funding the weekend.
- Build the small things around what she specifically loves. That’s what she’ll remember.