STAY IN FAVOUR:ECO FRIENDLY WEDDING IDEAS
FEATURING
It always warms our hearts when we see couples planning a sustainable wedding day and working towards reducing the carbon footprint of their celebrations.
Eco friendly wedding favour ideas
One perfect way of sharing your values, and keeping things eco friendly, is with your wedding favours.
Wedding favours are a fab way of saying thank you to everyone who has come along to be part of your wedding day. Gone are the days of sugared almonds, instead couples are seeking far more unique ways to “favour” their guests. If those favours can be eco friendly too then so much the better.
Here are some of our favourites that we’ve seen at weddings over the years. They are lovely gifts for guests as well as encouraging people to think a little more sustainably.
1 – HOME MADE OR LOCALLY SOURCED GOODIES
We’re mainly talking preserves there but we’ve also seen cookies, chocolates and flavoured alcohol – gotta love those damson gins!
Who isn’t excited by a little homemade treat?! This is a total crowd pleaser. You could recruit family and friends to help you make the favours, or support a local farm shop and buy them from there. We guarantee that your guests will love having a pot of jam or some chutney to take home.
2 – PLANT A TREE
We love this idea. Offset the carbon footprint of your wedding by planting trees. No, don’t panic, we don’t mean literally going out and planting them yourselves. You can sponsor the planting of trees. How many depends on your wedding carbon footprint. And if you’re mathematically minded, and love a spreadsheet, you could even work out the total miles your guests have travelled to join you on your day, and plant trees to offset those emissions too.
There are various websites out there that will help with this. A few we love are Greenpop and Plasbos. Or check out Trees for Life, who are rewilding the Scottish Highlands.
3 – SEED PACKETS
Another favour that we think is fab, seeds! There are so many options for this, from packets of lavender to encourage the local bee population through to Seedboms with personalised messages and all kinds of colours and seed types to choose from.
A few things to keep in mind – overseas guests may not be able to transport seeds or bulbs through customs and be careful not to give out an invasive species.
4 – FAIRTRADE OR ORGANIC COFFEE
** If you’re not a fan of caffeine then you could swap these out for tea blends. **
Independent coffee shops are everywhere now, and baristas love chatting to people about beans and grinds and flavours… so why not pop along to your local and find out more. You could gift a wee bag of coffee to each guest. We promise that coffee fans and new parents will love you!
You’re supporting a local business as well as being eco friendly with your favours. Win win! Just make sure that whatever coffee you choose is Fair Trade and Organic so you know you’re helping to protect the welfare of the producers too.
5 – CANDLES
Beautiful, long lasting and eco friendly? Sounds like the perfect wedding favour to us!
These take a little research, just to ensure the candles you’re buying aren’t full of nasty chemicals which are harmful to the planet. But there are plenty of lovely eco-friendly ones out there. Take note of packaging as well, and avoid companies that use single use plastics.
6 – REUSUABLE STRAWS OR CUTLERY
We’re in 2026, why is single use plastic cutlery still a thing?! Take a stand and encourage your guests to get onboard with zero waste by gifting them reusable straws or cutlery.
Now, a lot of guests may have already replaced single use plastics with eco-friendly straws and/or cutlery so you could set up a ‘favour station’ offering a reduced number of straws and cutlery items. Pop a wee note (on recycled paper) on the tables, explaining your approach, and point guests in the direction of the favour station should they wish to take home a wedding favour.
7 – FEED THE BIRDS
This is such a lovely favour, and you’ll win extra brownie points from any nature loving guests! As an added bonus, birdseed is pretty inexpensive too. Source some biodegradable envelopes to pop the seed in and your favours are sorted.
8 – FLORAL CENTREPIECES
The waste generated by weddings and the wedding industry is eye-watering. Recycle wherever you can, and an easy way to do this is to double up any floral centrepieces as wedding favours.
Think about sourcing a load of vases, bottles and glasses from charity shops, guests can use these to take their flowers home at the end of the day. Alternatively, instead of having one big centrepiece per table you could have more, smaller ones. Bud vases lining the length of a trestle table looks fab, gives a pop of colour and are easy for guests to take home as a memento from your day.
9. JUST SAY NO … TO WEDDING FAVOURS
If none of the ideas above float your boat then it’s absolutely fine to opt out of the wedding favour tradition altogether. Instead you could think about donating the money you would’ve spent to a charity that is close to your hearts. You can share a note on the tables or at each place setting explaining to guests you’ve made a meaningful donation and how the money will be used.
10 – RENTING IS BETTER THAN BUYING
On a final note, think about renting rather than buying. We always try to stress this to any couples we work with. There is a lot of waste that comes with weddings, so let’s not contribute to that unless we absolutely have to. Why buy wedding items when you can hire them in?
Hopefully you’ve found this useful and it’s given you lots to think about. Remember, if you need any help with finding the very best Scottish wedding suppliers then you know where we are!
