Bucking the trend: Stags prioritise bonding over boozing
While it’s still very much big business, the pre-wedding stag is moving from day-long pub sessions and seedy nightclubs to a more proactive day. It’s about old pals reuniting, writes
OPEN season has just been declared on stags.
As wedding season gets under way, grooms-to-be across the country are certain to be celebrating the last fling before the ring.
The good news for their brides is that drunken tattoos and shaved heads could soon be a thing of the past.
“The day of sitting in the pub all weekend and getting plastered is definitely gone,” says Dean Gammell of Stagit.ie, Ireland’s leading stag company, which also offers hen party packages over at Henit.ie.
“The guys definitely do want to be getting out and doing something.
“In a lot of cases, these guys haven’t seen each other in a long time — and you’d have people coming from England or Australia just for the weekend.
“They want to have a bit of craic — but they don’t want to be plastered and dying all weekend either.”
Wild in every sense of the word, Carrick-on-Shannon in Leitrim is still the main stalking ground for stags, according to the company owner, closely followed by Kilkenny and Galway.
Further afield, Prague, Newcastle, and Liverpool are the most frequented, with wholesome activities like paintballing now reportedly outstripping the likes of lap-dancing clubs.
“In the last few years, bubble soccer would have been massive,” Dean says of Ireland’s changing trends in stag dos. “Then foot darts came out, and everyone did foot darts.
“Now it’s starting to come back around to the good old classics like go-karting and paintballing.
“Your average group size is about 15 people, while the average age would be around 29-30.
“The average price that people would pay for the weekend would be about €140 a head [in Ireland] and €200 [abroad], excluding flights.
“Spending wise, it depends how thirsty you are, really!”
In hot pursuit of the perfect stag, some herds don’t even make it to the watering hole. “We’ve had some amusing different sorts of groups through our books,” he says.
“Probably one of the most interesting was a bunch of gamers [who] just wanted to be in a big house with a big television for the weekend.
“They wanted to just play the PlayStation; they didn’t want anyone to disturb them — and that was their weekend.
“I guess you have all sorts.
“There are certain groups that just want to go drinking as well — but they’re few and far between.”
From 1984 comedy Bachelor Party to The Hangover trilogy, of course, that hasn’t stopped Hollywood from perpetuating the notion that “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas”.
Nor online retailer PrezzyBox.com from capitalising on the stereotype of the ultimate lads’ night out by selling a €16 gag ‘Bubble Wrap Costume’ for husbands-to-be.
With the average age for Irish grooms soaring from an all-time low of 26 in 1977 to an all-time high of 35 in 2016, today’s pre-wedding ritual is more likely to be about bonding than boozing, according to experts.
“Initiation rights have long since been an important part of human interaction and growth,” explains psychotherapist Fergus Breen of Connolly Counselling Centre in Dublin (counsellor.ie), “and bachelor parties are an initiation ceremony in their own way.
“It marks the death of an old way of life and the beginning of a new one.
“In some cultures, it is done through the beckoning of the young man into ‘maturity’ by the older generation in an honouring ceremony.
“In our society, it has been quite the opposite — it is a dishonouring ceremony [where] the man is often stripped or made to wear women’s clothing or subjected to the power of a woman stripping in front of him while his peers joke about how he will now be ‘under the thumb’.
“Of late, a [new] sincerity has started to come into play where men are maturing to see the change ahead of them, and instead of a day of drinking and stripping, they are having barbecues and archery or footgolf as a genuine honouring of the change that is ahead.
“This is in part due to the fact that men are getting married later in life and [in part due to the fact that] men’s relationship with alcohol is slowly changing.”
After being slathered in bronzer by his best pals on his stag, factory worker Emmet Farrell from Dublin told how the tan may have faded but the memories haven’t.
“About 14 of us went to Carrick-on-Shannon for two nights seven weeks before the wedding,” recalls the 36-year-old, who wed sweetheart Sinead Barrett in November 2016.
“On Friday night, we went for a few drinks; then on Saturday, we did clay pigeon shooting and went on the Moon River boat, which has a bar onboard, for an hour-long cruise.
“Wearing fake tan and a wig, I definitely got more attention than I normally would on a night out, but it was great fun.
“Some of the lads have families and live in different parts of the country, so getting everyone in the same room isn’t easy, which is why it was so important to me.
“I tried to make sure not to drink too much because I wanted to remember it, and luckily didn’t have a sore head the next morning — getting the fake tan off was another story.”
Like Prince Harry, who reportedly shed half a stone in the run-up to his royal wedding, there could be a more practical reason why stags are putting the knee up back into knees-up.
“Men have definitely become a lot more health-focused over the last few years,” says Darragh Hayes, personal trainer and owner of The Cover Model Body Gym in Dublin. “It’s no longer just brides-to-be going on pre-wedding diets and training regimes — we’ve seen a big increase in the number of grooms-to-be looking to shape up too.
“Cutting down on alcohol in the months leading up to the big day will help a lot when it comes to getting results, along with eating the right foods and getting enough sleep.”
Others believe it is the #MeToo movement — which continues to shine a spotlight on sexual harassment of women the world over — that has encouraged modern stags to rein it in.
Although ‘full monty’ strippers still account for almost a third of both stag and hen party business at Hot Stuff Entertainment in Dublin, bosses have also reported a rise in demand for more covered-up performers such as old-fashioned kissograms.
“Obviously, with everything that’s happening, people are becoming more and more aware of the borderline seediness of the nudity part of the industry,” says Costa Manuel of Strip.ie, which represents The Angels of Sin as well as The Hunks of Desire adult entertainers.
“Eventually that doesn’t sell; eventually it doesn’t work for people — especially for a wedding[-related celebration].”
He estimates that 30% of customers look for the Las Vegas experience: “Shots of tequila, in comes the stripper, and they’re all waiting for the two minutes where she’ll have no clothes on. It’s still a significant part of the scene, but it’s the one that is dwindling rather than growing.”
Elsewhere, at engineer Alan Heffernan’s last hurrah last month, things definitely got a bit racy.
The 34-year-old and fiancée Róisín Malone had a joint stag and hen — otherwise known as a sten — with their pals at Fairyhouse Racecourse in Meath.
“I’ve been on loads of stags in the last few years,” says groom-to-be Alan, who lives in Nobber and is set to wed this August.
“It was always a night away with [an activity like] paintballing or something like that.
“Myself and Róisín decided to have a sten because we have the same group of friends. We’re into the horses so we said we’d go up to Fairyhouse for the races.
“I don’t feel like I missed out by not having a typical stag.
“Everyone had a great day and it was something different.
“But there were still a few sore heads the next morning.”
Ultimately, while the more laddish aspects of the rite of passage may be in the crosshairs, there’s no sign of stags becoming extinct, agree the experts.
“Bachelor parties can mask the sadness a friend group can feel at the change in dynamics that is ahead of them,” says counsellor Fergus Breen.
“The groom can also be afraid of his choice and the impending change in freedom and autonomy, so feels the need to have ‘one more’ night of doing whatever he wants to prove his independence to himself.
“Coupled with the psychology of stag parties, there is also the economic factor where plenty of hotels, bars, and companies can make a lot of money off them, so they are constantly promoted.
“The idea of a stag party as an initiation ceremony may change and morph, but it will continue to thrive in one way or another.”
“Someone once said to me before, stags and hens are such a good business to be in because it’s almost like the funeral business,” adds Dean Gammell of Stagit.ie.
“You’re always going to have people dying and, like stags and hens, you’re always going to have people getting married.
“It’s the one occasion that everyone really makes an effort for their friend.”
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