Being green and environmentally friendly is top of the agenda at the moment across the world and it seems the need to be eco-friendly has spread to weddings too. Even if you don’t apply eco-friendly practices to much of your wedding, you can still give your guests eco-friendly wedding favors.
Here are my top suggestions for ‘green’ favors:
Organic Edibles: Custom cookies are all the rage at the moment for favors so have yours made with all organic ingredients and naturally colored icings. If you didn’t want cookies you could apply the same to cupcakes or mini cakes as well. Present either in card boxes made from recycled paper.
Fair Trade Edibles: There is a wealth of choice here, including chocolates, tea, coffee, cocoa, wine and more specialized edibles. Take a trip around your local supermarket as most have Fair Trade products on their shelves these days or have a section dedicated to them.
Depending on what you buy you need to think carefully about the packaging. Things like tea and coffee would be best presented in small tins, this not only keeps the contents fresh, but the tins are also recyclable when empty – although they do make useful little containers for other things. Chocolates and other ‘solid’ food stuffs could be presented in card boxes made from recycled paper. As long as the packaging itself is ultimately recyclable then anything goes.
Plants and Seeds: Plants, seeds and flower bulbs are probably the ultimate eco-friendly wedding favor, although there is an argument about introducing non-native species to an area (but we won’t go into that here!). You can choose to give small plant seedlings, packets of seeds, plant-able cards which have seeds embedded in them or bulbs.
Take this a step further by looking for those that have been grown or produced organically, that is without any chemical fertilizers, pesticides or herbicides. If you give seeds then add in a small info card about growing organically.
Candles: Candles are a popular wedding favor choice with votives and tea lights being the most popular sizes. However, many candles are made with harmful chemical ingredients which release pollutants when lit. Look for candles made from organic ingredients or beeswax.
Recycled Favors: Check out items made from recycled materials, not just paper or card but things like car tires, glass, metal and plastic. Things like pencils to notebooks, cards to photograph frames can all be produced from recycles.
Organic Skincare: Many favor stores sell small boxed sets of soaps, so look for similar versions made from organic ingredients. Be careful though that what you are buying is made from 100% organic ingredients, one look at the label should tell you what’s included and you will be able to see if any chemical ingredients have been used. If organic ingredients have been used you will recognize them.
Other options to soap include bath salts, bath bombs and small bottles of hand cream, body lotion or shower gel. These can all be bought in large packs and then decanted into smaller containers such as packets, bottles, tins etc at home.
Mae Andrea is a professional writer who collects wedding favors and wedding related articles. She is working with a wedding planning social networking company that caters to all the wedding needs of brides in almost every major center in America.
