James Moorhouse
A US couple has explained why they decided to charge guests an eye-watering fee to attend their wedding weekend in Idaho earlier this month.
Weddings can be an expensive business, even if you're a certain Amazon founder, and the days of a simple church wedding and party in the local town hall are long gone, with couples now deciding to take things in a much different direction.
Take Brewdog founder, James Watt, and his partner, Georgia Toffolo, who decided to give family and friends just 24 hours' notice to get themselves up to Scotland for the celebrations, or another couple who employed a similar tactic by sending wedding invitations on the same day, using a sneaky method to ensure everyone was free.
Now, a US couple has taken it to the next level by asking for money in exchange for entry to their nuptials.
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Entrepreneurs Marley Jaxx, 34, and Steve J. Larsen, 37, asked guests for $57 for a day-ticket, or $997 for a VIP ticket for two people to attend a full weekend event, which included premium seating options, a biohacking brunch and entry to the rehearsal dinner.
According to the couple, they ended up selling around 100 basic tickets, while 30 guests opted for the VIP treatment. However, they didn't charge their nearest and dearest for the chance to attend, instead sending them wedding invitations.
The idea of charging guests for entry to their wedding was something the couple had joked about before, thinking it would be 'funny'.
However, once they got engaged and actually began planning their wedding, they started seeing quotes for various wedding activities, like a '$650 cake-cutting fee'.
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"Like… just to cut the cake. Not the cake itself. Just to cut it." Jaxx told PEOPLE.
After sharing it with her social media followers, who detailed their own 'wild' wedding markups, she decided to go ahead with it - even debating with someone who disagreed with her on Facebook Live to defend her stance.
While Jaxx and Larsen were able to cover the costs of the wedding completely, they also raised another $132,550, which went towards their charity venture in Kenya.
"That money is going to build classrooms in Kenya, support clean water initiatives, and provide essential resources for kids who need them most," Jaxx explains. "In July 2026, we’re heading to Kenya with a crew of people to help build the very project we funded."
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Jaxx said she wanted to 'challenge' the notion that weddings are a 'multi-billion-dollar industry where couples often go into debt for a single day', but she knew that some would view it as a 'money grab'.
"But to me, a cash grab is something done purely for profit with little regard for value or integrity. That’s not what this is." she said. "We’re creating an experience to celebrate our wedding with people who want to be part of it, and the contributions go directly toward making that possible without going into debt, while also supporting one of our favourite causes."
The couple are hoping their plan 'becomes a blueprint for others and that this disrupts the way people think weddings have to be done'.
Jaxx said: "Weddings don’t need to be a source of debt or pressure. They can be something radically different that is generous, sacred and shared."