What is a Stag Party, And How is it Different From A Bachelor Party?

When you are planning to host a bachelor party for your groomsmen, depending on where you live, you might hear the term “stag party” or “stag raiser.” Planning one of our stag parties was a big inspiration for us to found Stag Pack, but if you are like most, you aren’t entirely sure what a stag party is, and where to start planning for one.

What is a Stag Party

A stag party is relatively simple in context but big in scale. A stag party is a bachelor party that's meant to help the groom raise money to spend on their wedding. Stag parties started as a Buffalo, NY tradition, right along with chicken wings and Sahlen's hot dogs, but it has spread outside of Buffalo to become a hidden wedding tradition. 

How to Raise Money at a Stag Party

The way you can raise funds to help pay for your wedding expenses traditionally comes to two things. One, it’s a ticketed event, so people will have to pay to get in. The ticket price should be a little more than the cost of food and drinks for the person at your chosen venue. Depending on where you decide to throw your stag party, it can be different.

The other way of raising money for the wedding is with raffle prizes. Guys like winning stuff, especially if it's cool. You sell tickets to everyone in the room who wants a chance to win and then pull the winning ticket. All goes well, and your groomsmen have new gifts, and the groom's wallet gets a little heavier.  It’s a great way for your groomsmen and friends to participate, and for the groom not to bleed even more money out of their wallet for their wedding.

There are other ways you can raise money during your party, 50/50s, poker, and other forms of gambling aren’t uncommon, but you should expect your main income to come from ticket sales and from raffle prizes.

Check out a more technical guide for organizing a stag raiser Here

What Kind of Things Should I Raffle?

Sometimes it can be challenging to buy gifts for guys, especially for groomsmen and other stag attendees. Luckily for you, we started this company to get raffle prizes for gifts just like these. For a prize, you want to choose something affordable, but not too cheap. You want to make money off the raffle, so a good range is $25-$100. People often bring things like signed sports memorabilia, gift certificates, bottles of booze, but that doesn’t mean you have to go that route. You could find something truly unique, that’s sort of the allure of a raffle. 

See a good selection of raffle prizes Here

Your prize should be something that gets the room talking in some way. Personal objects and gag gifts can be fun to auction too, but having too many of these and your stag party can feel disappointing and not exciting. We recommend getting a small themed gift box full of high-quality items that are guy-related. Golfing gifts, bartending gifts, or raffle prizes that feel high-class.

Check out our dedicated blog on Raffle Prizes

How is a Stag Party Diffrent from a Bachelor Party?

You may be curious how to whole stag-raising aspect of the party differs from a more standard bachelor party. There are a few key differences in addition to helping the groom fund their wedding.

Quantity over Quality

Ok, maybe that's harsh, but if you are hosting a stag party, you want to invite as many men (and women! see Stag and Doe) as possible to maximize your revenue. This is usually a good thing; you can have a much bigger party than you would have been able to in a normal bachelor party, with lots more guests. You may not know all of your guests as well, though, you should invite as many people as you can and encourage those people to invite their family and friends too. You could end up with friends of friends at your party, and maybe if you want things to be more lowkey, this might not be what you want.

Atmosphere of The Party

Stag parties can have a slightly different vibe than a normal bachelor party. You will still have lots of drinking, good food, and rowdy behavior. You can still get strippers and have a crazy night like any normal bachelor party. It’s basically the same as a bachelor party with a little bit more added on top.

You do have to dedicate some time to raffling off prizes, so that can change the tone of the party a little. In the end, it’s still about getting everyone together and having a great time in celebration of the groom's upcoming wedding.

Contributing to the Wedding

This should be obvious to your guests when you invite them, especially if they don’t know what a stag party is. You should make it explicitly clear that this is a ticketed event that helps the groom and the bride pay for their big day. 

If your guests are unfamiliar with the concept and are suddenly surprised to find out their best friend is charging them money, they can be rather upset. Make it clear when you invite everyone that this is a fundraiser, and there will be raffle prizes, so bring extra cash. 

Tell all your guests when you invite them:

• A Stag party is meant to raise money for the groom

• There will be raffle prizes at the party

• What they get out of it (Booze, food, chance, boobs, door prize etc.)

• How much tickets cost

• This is still a bachelor party 

People can get annoyed if they feel you are being disingenuous, but if you are honest about the point of your party and what it's going to entail, your friends, groomsmen, and guests will be happy to help contribute to your big day.

Hopefully, this answered what a stag party is and helped you plan for yours! If you need prizes for your raffle, check out our Raffle Prizes, OR if you are looking for wedding gifts, groomsmen gifts, or just a cool themed guy gift, see our Store.