OT: wedding planning question

I hope to hear the answer to this too! And is there a guarantee?

I think it doesn't matter how many will actually show up at the wedding, just the reception. My DD is planning the reception for the Garden Tent at the Pittsburgh Zoo. She is thinking about a buffet line reception rather than sit down dinner. I liked the hors d'oeuvres option available in the sit-down dinner package but the entree option in the buffet package. The difference is $10/person. We are going to see if we can just add the hot hors d'oeuvres option to the buffet, or select the entrees from the buffet choices. The sit down dinner option will be stretching the budget, I think, unless we can actually expect fewer guests than will be invited.

Elizabeth in Spring, Texas

require RSVP's by a date certain -- that falls within the window of your catering contract. In weddings I have attended that have a sit-down dinner --... I've always had to RSVP.

Doesn't it rather depend on the demographic of who you are inviting? If you invite a lot of people from far away, then you'd expect lower attendance than if few would have to travel far. 10% if probably a reasonable ball park number, but it could vary so much. Unless you have a large number of relatives that are all an equal amount removed from the couple, where you feel you have to invite all or none, then the variation in the numbers mostly comes from how many friends you invite and then you have to decide whether you prefer to have a cheaper reception with more people, or a more expensive one and cut the numbers. We've been to weddings where a much wider circle of friends has been invited than others and if that's the case, their may well be more refusals than if they were all close friends!

Cheers Anne

Right; I understand that. I was just trying to get that rough estimate so that it will help decide which plan we want to contract for. If I could "guesstimate" that the number of guests we might actually expect would end up being about what I would expect to may for the buffet if they all came, I would opt for the sit-down dinner. Does that make sense?

Doesn't it rather depend on the demographic of who you are inviting? If you invite a lot of people from far away, then you'd expect lower attendance than if few would have to travel far. 10% if probably a reasonable ball park number, but it could vary so much. Unless you have a large number of relatives that are all an equal amount removed from the couple, where you feel you have to invite all or none, then the variation in the numbers mostly comes from how many friends you invite and then you have to decide whether you prefer to have a cheaper reception with more people, or a more expensive one and cut the numbers. We've been to weddings where a much wider circle of friends has been invited than others and if that's the case, their may well be more refusals than if they were all close friends!

Cheers Anne

And then plan to telephone the people you haven't heard back from by the deadline. Some of them maybe twice. And then Aunt Jen will fail to show up after assuring you she would; but cousin Jessie will arrive with her new boyfriend who wasn't on the radar let alone the guest list back when you started ...

Most caterers will have a fudge-factor and if yours doesn't, ask for one. That is usually only 2-5, depending on buffet vs. sit-down, but still it helps.

Good luck, darl> require RSVP's by a date certain -- that falls within the window of your

Makes perfect sense, but IMO you should only invite the number you can afford. Then you don't have to lie awake nights hoping some of them don't come. Weddings are enough stress already! Roberta in D

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