So, the big day is less than 2 months away and pretty much all the formalities put in place, one of the few things I need to get sorted is my speech.

Put it short, I’m shy and never spoken to a large group of people, I know I’m going to struggle so I need to keep it short and sweet,

Thank you’s
-Bridesmaids
-Parents
-BestMan
-Bride

Obviously I’ll be going a little more indepth on each one but what else should I be adding apart from a large rum?

Perhaps a (long?) list of all your conquests prior to meeting MrsTP?
Rate them out of 10?
🙂
best of luck for the big day.
Just tell everyone how much you love her.

The guests.

Thank the people that couldn’t be bothered to turn up or are dead.

Just keep it short and sweat…

Short on the thanks, a bit longer on the sweat part… telling everyone how lucky you feel to be marrying such beautiful (you’ll get all the ladies in the room on yourside with this one) wonderful, loving etc etc lady

Your opening line has to be ‘on behalf of myself and my ex-girlfriend…..’

See how long that takes to register with some people?

I’ve never been a Groom, but I’ve been Best Man a couple of times. (aaw, etc)

One pearl of wisdom that I’ll offer you is this. Don’t sweat it.

You’ll be surrounded by the single most receptive audience you’re ever likely to see. They’re all friends and family, they’re all there solely to wish you and your partner well, and most crucially of all by the time you have to stand up they’ll have been tearing through bucks fizz and bottles of wine for the last two hours. In the last speech I made, I managed to shoehorn a World of Warcraft joke in there and even that went down well.

One pearl of wisdom that I’ll offer you is this. Don’t sweat it.

You’ll be surrounded by the single most receptive audience you’re ever likely to see. They’re all friends and family, they’re all there solely to wish you and your partner well, and most crucially of all by the time you have to stand up they’ll have been tearing through bucks fizz and bottles of wine for the last two hours.

+1

you’ll be fine

Try and do the speeches before the food. Everyone will want you to get on with it so they can eat. Also that way you can actually enjoy the food.
Ps run through your speech with a lady.The easiest person to offend is a woman at a wedding.

thank the guests for coming and all your prezzies!!

Think I said something like, “thank you for your presence, and your presents”

Best man and ushers, get a dig in if you can as you will likely get slated during the BM speach.

Any older relatives you would like to mention? grannies etc or those that cant be there??

As above mate. Thank everybody for coming, say how lovely the bridesmaids looked and throw in a “on behalf of my wife and I”… Got me a few claps and whoops.

Also throw on some light hearted jokes, how u met, where u got engaged etc.

I started with,

“Ladies and gentleman, this is the one and only time I will speak for myself and wife”

And re best man/men, I said..

“Now there it is time to hand you over to my bestman, but before I do I should warn you that he has been known to randomly invent stories and situations that I may or may not have been involved in.. However it took alot of persuading to let them release him for the day, so please be patient and go along with his world of make believe”

Can’t remember the exact words but something like that..anyway, don’t worry about it, I didn’t and I am not good at public speaking at all, everybody said it was really good, I wasn’t sure it went well but some ladies were greeting so all good ; )

My bestman did a cheeky little lymiric about me.. Very amusing.

You’ll be surrounded by the single most receptive audience you’re ever likely to see. They’re all friends and family, they’re all there solely to wish you and your partner well, and most crucially of all by the time you have to stand up they’ll have been tearing through bucks fizz and bottles of wine for the last two hours.

+1

you’ll be fine

Does nobody else heckle at weddings then? 😳

Meh just make it up as you go along….I did the usual thank yous etc insinuated that Mrs B was going to get a right seeing to, swore and rambled for a few seconds at which point my mum made me shut up 🙂

Enjoy! Being married is ace and my wedding day was the best day ever!

Not been a groom but I was best man last august and I think most of the same applies. Whatever you do, don’t leave it till the last minute to write the speech. The more prepared you are and the more you know what you want to say, the better. It will never be delivered exactly like you think it will, but I felt way more comfortable and confident knowing my speech inside out and speaking to a room full of people. Dont worry too much, everyone in the room is behind you. I also used a dictaphone to record my voice, which 1, was proper cringe, but 2 really helpful with timing, it meant I could hear what didn’t work well and how long to make it. Something on paper might feel fine but start reading it out and it soon becomes an epic bore. The groom for the wedding didnt go through his until the night before and it went on for half an hour! Enjoy it, na scrap that, you wont enjoy it, until its over probably, but im sure you will be fine.

After someone flagged up mums net yesterday it is now apparent that “not sweating it” might be the wrong answer. Seemingly the world is filled with MILs SILs FILs BILs GMs DHs DPs DCs and a whole host of others out to make your wedding day a living hell.

i completely forgot to think about mine, and didnt give it any consideration until the brides father sat down, then all eyes were on me. so i just made it up as i went along. thing is, everyone is really happy for you and want to be there so as long as you don’t swear too much or insult the MiL you’ll be fine. i ran out of stuff to say so asked what i should say next so they told me. it was fun. really, don’t sweat it.

remember to say how amazing your new wife looks. everything else is secondary!

I completely winged my speech, I was already fairly hammered so stood up and spouted crap for five minutes.

Remember to tell the bride she looks beautiful or you will never hear the end of it!

Concider this thread marked for my upcoming nuptials.

Easiest speech I ever made. I had a list of people to thank, and a couple of choice phrases I wanted to fit in; just winged the rest.

Choice phrases:
“My Wife and I…” <pause for ahhhs and tears>
also, we had been together for years so I threw this in:
“We’ve been together for x years, and lived together for y. But I’m not marrying you because I want to live with you, I’m marrying you because I can’t live without you” <that one brought the house down 😉 >

Good luck 🙂

What Cougar says – relax and try and enjoy it, the audience will be 100% behind you. You might like to try and practice a little in the weeks before hand, to some mates and get them to sit at far end of the room when you practice so you get used to speaking to the “back of the room”

@binners – had to bite my tongue at last wedding I attended when the best man (groom’s brother) started going on at length about how pleased he was to have just been awarded his PhD (sibling rivalry I suspect as groom went to Cambridge) – I so nearly shouted out “move on, today isn’t about you”

@alphabus – that line brought a tear to my eye – well done !

I got married Friday just gone, had a fantastic day, never thought I’d enjoy my wedding so much!

Anyway, seriously, just Google ‘Grooms Speech’ there is an almost never-ending ream of useful information and ideas, loads of examples submitted by grooms etc. You don’t need to copy, but it’ll give you some ideas and might help you to include some good things that you wouldn’t have otherwise thought of

I didn’t write my speech until 2 days before the wedding as I’d originally planned to make it up as I went along. I’m glad I did prepare one though, it went well if I do say so myself.

Oh, and a double Jack Daniels with my Weetabix certainly helped get the day going 😀

We’ve been together for x years, and lived together for y. But I’m not marrying you because I want to live with you, I’m marrying you because I can’t live without you” <that one brought the house down >

I used that too, did you steal it from me? or tinternets?

organic355
I used that too

Great minds… It is very possible I stole it from somewhere. I tried to steer clear of any ‘research’ before doing my speech because my brain becomes incapable of original thought when I’m exposed to other people’s work.

Dave

You’ll be surrounded by the single most receptive audience you’re ever likely to see

This. I had people rolling in the aisles over what were a couple of mildly amusing quips.

Also, get in a couple of digs about the best man – you’ll be getting plenty back.

Open with ‘my wife and I would like to thank…..’
Make sure to thank the bridesmaids, in laws for thier daughter, parents, family and guests for coming.
Comment on how beautiful your wife looks. Maybe throw in a joke and end with something soppy.

I wrote the official bits then left it blank for how i felt on the day after that.

It was easy – you’ll be fine. Hit the brakes and fly right by.

“My ex-girlfriend and I would like to thank you all for coming…..”

Easiest speech you’ll ever do, everyone is behind you as others have said. Follow the formula above from peter1979 and you’ll be fine. I was stone cold sober and had a great time.

Entertainment is for the best man. You’re just there to thank people.

Wish I could get married again (had a great day), but the wife won’t let me.

but the wife won’t let me.

Try asking one of the bridesmaids 😉

seems wise to write something down, went to my friends wedding last week and he didn’t mention the bride once…..

Very interested to here more of the STW Massif Groom one-liners to throw in 😀

Planning to be too soppy can sound cheesy when the rehearsed lines come out so my plan for that aspect is to go with the flow… we shall see!

Planning to be too soppy can sound cheesy when the rehearsed lines come out so my plan for that aspect is to go with the flow… we shall see!

Make it as soppy as possible, then follow with “I would carry on, but I can’t read her writing”.

I hadn’t even thought of this! I have till September so thanks for the reminder.

Speeches are easy though, I’m hoping I’ll be as giddy as a giddy thing so a speech is the least of my worries.

I’ve got to sort mine out before Aug BH WE…..

Few bits from my wedding speach that went down well….

Quote from Homer Simpson: Being married is like living with your best friend……<pause>…….except you also get to play with their boobies.

Probably the only day I’ll get away with saying boobies infront of the straight laced church going MIL.

Thank the brides parents for bringing up such a lovely/caring/wonderful/beautiful/etc daughter……..as she made a great bridesmaid.

Only works if your wifes sister is a bridesmaid.

Comment on how cute/georgous the young (aged 3 in our case) flower girl looked…….and how she obviously got her looks from her mum.

The best bit was after her father pipes up ‘No she didn’t’ she shouted ‘Yes I did!’. Her timing was impeccable and had the whole place in stitches. But you can’t rely on getting the responses back.

A soppy bit about your wife will go down well, especially if it (at least appears) of the cuff and straight from the heart.

You’ll be reet – the pressure will all be on the best man so just keep reminding him of that and enjoy the day!

On my speech i managed to mention how good the wedding cake was, made by wifes gran, and would be superb for carbo loading, and also the benefits of a carbon frame over titanium (cant remember the context) but got some laughs. Jokes are good in speechs.

I’m pretty sure that I called my best man a knob at some point during mine too 😆 it’s all a little hazy!

+1 Everyone stating that this will be the most supportive and receptive audience you will ever have.

Plenty of basics in this thread, “on behalf of my wife and I / ex girlfriend”, say a few things and thank and toast the bridesmaids.

Do prepare something, don’t panic and don’t drink too much before your speech. I was happy to speak after our meal, but knew that my father in law and best man were keen to get it out the way and enjoy their dinner.

If you are shy or feel uncomfortable about speaking in public, keep it short and simple. Nerves are good but do not overly worry about it.

Important edit there, or the mother of all freudian slips 😳 🙂

Massive thanks to all the replies and words of encouragement! 😀

Will get it written down over the next week or two, keep it short and sweet and try to not sweat! (far easier said than done!)

Would it be wrong to bring up the incredibly presumptuous way my wife initially got my attention or should I leave the embarrassing stuff for the best man to aim at myself?!