Question About Party Favor Etiquette

Personalized favors are a great idea if.. everyone RSVPs. you'll be better off ordering them for the whole party then see who shows up. I've had parents RSVP at the last minute or not at all and the children show up. I can be very frustrating

I agree that non personalized favors are probably better, but if you are still going to, then I would say have one for everyone you invited. My son had a party and only 3 RSVP'd, 4 showed up...total out of 17 invited. I got a favor for each child. Well I completely forgot to give them to the kids, so I ended up sending all favors to school with kids names on them...including my son! You never know which way your party could go and you could still have someone RSVP the day before!

F., I have my own personalized party favor business and give a 10% discount to Mamasource members. I run into this problem all the time. Please call me and we can discuss your options. Check out my website to see the favors I have available. www.littleshopoffavors.com

Not sure what the cost factor is here, but if you are going to eliminate those who have already said "no" then you shouldn't give them to those who RSVP "no" at a later date. If it's not a financial decision, order each a favor and send them with the thank you note!

Hi F.,

I would give them to the kids who attend your party. Unless its a sibling of one of the kids who did attend and they could not make it. :)

Buy enough favors for every child invited to the party...
Some children will come, some might not...some might not attend but might send a gift along for your child anyway....I would give every child who attends the party a favor and would send a favor to anyone who didn't come but had sent a gift along with a thank you note. Any left over favors, I would donate to the hospital for the children...

If you are ordering personalized favors, I would go ahead and give them to everyone you invite, even if they don't attend otherwise you're wasting your money. Perhaps it's not an expensive item, but I would stick with non-personlized favors. For a 4 year old's party you may be pretty good friends with the parents of whomever you invited and not be concerned, but as they get older this will not be the case and I only get favors for those who RSVP and maybe one or two extra. You'll find that some parents don't RSVP, or may call the morning of the party to make sure a child can still come, so I try to come up with inexpensive & creative things for goody bags.

don't really know if there's etiquette for this one. suggestion, he's only 4, why customize...when the kids are older it amy mean more. why not get really cool water bottles (reuseable) and put the kids name of them yourself with permanant marker.

Hi F. -

Since having parties for my kiddos, I have also just ordered the number of favors that is invited whether they can come or not. A favor is given to the ones who couldn't come too! so if you invite 12 kids, I would get 12 favors. HTH!!!

Unless you are making them yourself, or have tons of $$ to spend last minute, non-personalized favors are best. Order enough to cover everyone invited, but it is totally your choice to give to everyone or only those who attend. I almost always only give to those attending, unless non-attendees give a gift, or are a "special" friend. But that is your call. Either way is ok, I think. Happy Birthday to your son!

Hi F.,
It's not necessary to give a favor to kids who do not come to the party, but you will need to order enough for anyone who might be coming. It's always good to be prepared - whenever I've bought things for parties, I've bought more than I needed and returned stuff later if I had to. If you end up with more favors than guests and want to give them to kids who didn't come, it's fine to do that but not required - but if you had to pay shipping for them and would have to pay to send them back, it may just be cheaper to give them out!