Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Wediquette: The Importance of Assigned Seating

My sister has decided against having escort cards or place cards at her wedding. They are having over 200 people attending and she doesn't want the hassle of creating a seating chart. I've tried to get her to understand that this may not be the best course of action, but she won't see the light - what can I say to her to convince her otherwise?

I will preface my advice with this: personally, I think that giving your guests guidance on where to sit during a wedding reception is hugely important and when I attend weddings I always am flabbergasted when couples haven't taken the time to assign a table to their guests.

That said, some couples think that creating a seating chart or assigning tables to guests is a massive chore. What if you put two enemies together? What if no one talks to each other? What if, what if, what if. Firstly, people will always talk to each other and if they don't, its not like they are sitting at this table for the rest of time. Its a few hours at most. Secondly, if two adults can't get over themselves for a couple hours at a wedding and sit together and be civil, they have bigger problems in life that just aren't your problem.

The real reason to have assigned tables at a wedding is this: if you don't, most tables won't get filled to capacity and your wait staff will have a heck of a time running between two barely filled tables rather than waiting on one full table. To me, it also looks ridiculous when half the tables aren't filled - your photographer will get those images and it just looks sloppy.

It's also a bit of an insult {again, in my opinion} to your guests to not provide guidance with a table assignment - your guests have spent time and money to be at the wedding, why can't you spend some time giving them a table to call home during your reception? As an example, at a family member's wedding several years ago, there were no table assignments and the tables were split into three rooms - it was complete chaos trying to find a seat let alone keep that seat for the rest of the night. I asked the bride why they didn't do table assignments and she just said that she didn't feel like it. To me, that's no excuse because the wedding just looked unorganized and felt like musical chairs.

So please, spend an afternoon assigning your guests a table during your wedding, everyone will thank you later.

1 comment:

  1. I completely agree with this! I think the easiest way to do seating is to take an afternoon and some popcorn and wine (if that's your thing!) and churn it out. As much as your wedding is about you, it's also about the fact that your guests have travelled from near and far to be with you on this day, and you want to make sure it's a comfortable situation for them as well.

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