These more luxurious trips are also longer than the typical one-night party that past generations favored. According to data from Wedding Wire, one in three bachelor or bachelorette parties take place for three or more days.

With friend groups so often dispersed geographically, a longer pre-wedding party has become a necessity of sorts, “especially if your groomsmen or bridesmaids don’t know each other,” says Jamie Chang, destination wedding planner for Mango Muse Events.

Gender Neutral, Joint Parties
The strict male-female divide typical of stag and hen parties of years past is also changing.

“Something that was really important to me, and I think this goes along of being in my 30s, was that the party was made up of people from all different points in my lives,” says Jenna Citron, a 32-year-old bride in New York who works as the executive director of nonprofit Queens College Hillel. This meant that inviting her best friend Jon from high school along for her bachelorette was natural, given that he’s also a member of her bridal party.

“At my age, I couldn’t imagine going and doing a strip-club, glitter-filled drink fest. It’s not who I am,” she says of planning her four-day trip to Disney World next month, ahead of her November wedding.

“Up until recently it’s always been a very gendered affair,” Mauberret says. But now, most adults, especially those in their late 20s or 30s, have close friends of both genders.

One in 10 couples has a joint bachelor or bachelorette party, according to Wedding Wire. Photographer: Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images North America
This is especially the case with same-sex marriages, which are on the rise, with 10.2% of LGBTQ Americans married to a same-sex spouse in 2017, compared to 7.9% in 2015, during the months before the Supreme Court’s legalization of gay marriage, according to a Gallup survey. In 2017, 61% of same sex couples were married, up from 38% before the ruling.

One in 10 couples is even opting for a joint party, says Kim Forrest, senior editor at Wedding Wire, starting the night with separate activities and then meeting up later in the evening.

“The wedding party isn’t divided up by gender [anymore], so why should your bachelor or bachelorette party be?” Forrest says. “It also opens it up to having family members be part of it.”

Adventure Time
Brides- and grooms-to-be are also seeking out more adrenaline-boosting activities than in the past, says Nikki Clause, founder and creative planner of Fling Before the Ring. Requests for workout classes such as yoga and kickboxing are common from her female clients; recently, she arranged for a group in Detroit to attend a private aerialist class at a local circus school. “We just thought that was totally out of the box and so different,” she says.