The Timing Of Your Wedding Celebration

Your wedding ceremony ends at 2:30 pm, but your reception won’t start until 6:30 pm. What should you do? This presents a four hour window, with nothing for your guests to do? We see this happen more often than not as a result of multiple ceremonies at the same place of worship, where the bride is left with the only time slot left.

When you have such a large gap between the ceremony and reception, it often creates a less successful reception, because guests are more likely to leave early.

How can this problem be solved? Call your reception venue and find out what their flexibility is in scheduling. If your ceremony is at noon or 1:00 pm, consider having an afternoon reception with a late lunch. You could save thousands by having an afternoon reception.

Some couples have created the gap intentionally knowing that they will be getting their photo’s taken with the bridal party and family members. If this is the case, make sure you create something for the guests, especially the out-of-town guests to do during this time.

Have a cocktail hour with snacks after the ceremony at the venue before dinner. This will help to absorb the time between the ceremony and reception. At the venue, you could have table games like bride/groom trivia, or have your DJ arrange some fun games with your guests to help them occupy the time.

Another idea could be to hold your receiving line at the reception venue instead of at the ceremony to help absorb some of the time as well.

Try to schedule the day’s events with your guests in mind, they will be glad, and your reception will flow much smoother. You and your guests will be happy!

If you would like to have us at your upcoming wedding, please check out our website at http://www.soundsensationsent.com or request further information, you can check date availability for an upcoming reception. Remember, we offer wedding disc jockey & DJ entertainment, photo booth rentals, wedding uplighting, event lighting, a/v rentals and services, and multi media slide show creation for all of Wisconsin including Appleton, Green Bay, Wausau, Milwaukee, Stevens Point, Oshkosh, and Janesville.