A U.K. mother has come under fire after her family contributed financially to their Christmas meals. The woman explained how expensive it was to feed 10 people over three days and justified having her relatives help pay for the food. However, some on social expressed disagreement, maintaining that guests should never pay for food.
Inquiring whether people had similar practices, she said, “So my family always want to chip in. Like I’ve never actually actively gone and asked them for money. They want to chip in. They want to know how much I want to like put towards dinner. I find it really hard to know what to ask them for, like, how much to tell them.”
She continued, “So today it is big food shop day. I’m doing the big Christmas shop because I don’t want to, like, over charge or under charge. Charge is the wrong word, but, like, I don’t want to tell them too much or too little. So I’m going to go do all of the shopping. I’m going to go to Aldi and Tesco, two separate trips, because girl needs to refuel in between that thing.”
The mother added, “Then I will share the breakdown of how much it costs, like how much both shops cost, and then what that kind of works out to be per person. What I will say is, I’m feeding 10 people for three days, like this is Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day. There’s 10 of us, so it’s a lot. So I’m very grateful that my family want to contribute, because, oh my goodness, it’s gonna be expensive.”
The clip has since gone viral on social media, garnering a wide variety of opinions. One person wrote, “When I invite people to dinner I don’t ask them to bring anything let alone charge them for dinner. She needs to class up her act. Don’t invite them if you can’t afford to do so. Cooking a dinner is my gift to family and friends. Get some class, honey!”
Another person disagreed with the premise of having family members pay for their food. “I’ve been feeding fifteen to 20 every Christmas for years. My daughter does the same on Christmas Eve and my daughter in law hosts our family Christmas party earlier in the season. We all help. We all do our fair share of hosting. Nobody asks for money,” they said.
However, some defended the woman’s decision to have everyone chip in. “People should learn to read, listen, and comprehend so they can understand what happened,” another user wrote. “I will say it may help with backlash if her opening line wasn’t, I charge my family….It should have been more along the lines of, I took my family up on their offer to help cover the cost of holiday meals and it cost us $32 each. 
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Continuing to substantiate their defense of having guests chip in for the food, they added in the comment, “$32 for three days worth of meals is a steal. It’s not always about who’s hosting, it is usually about location and space. She shouldn’t have to fund everything because she has the space and desired location for the family.”
Watch the woman share details about Christmas food below:
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.