Wedding: Top Guest Complaints
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| Source: Pinterst |
P’s & Q’s
Your special day will have been filled with all the people closest to you - and maybe some people you don’t actually like – and most if not all of these people will give you a wedding gift or wish, it’s impolite and bad etiquette to not say thank you to everyone for their gifts and wishes. But not just a “thanks” on the day or a text afterwards, it’s polite to send individual thank you ’s afterwards and if possible include a comment about what you was given. If it’s a cash gift, a simple “Thank you John and Jane Doe for your extremely generous cash gift” will go a long way. You’d be surprised how many weddings that we have been too that have simply forgotten to say anything, which – when considering how much effort and money guests spend to attend a wedding – is really quite rude. Just head to Paperchase, they have some super cute thank you cards that are about £3/£4 for a pack of 10 and get sending.
CHILDREN
It’s surprising that in the 21st Century, some guests still moan about children attending your wedding. At the end of the day, regardless of whether the children are family or friends they should still be welcome. I don’t really have much advise on this as we have welcomed anyone to bring their children, we have just said that children under 3 are unable to join us for food as the venue won’t cater for children that young, but I would never tell a family they were not able to bring their children. However, there maybe a few things you can do to keep the children entertained to give the parents chance to enjoy themselves and to stop some guests having one too many opinions. We have hired a bouncy castle for the children – okay, and adults – to keep them entertained, we have also arranged for a babysitter that will help look after the children, will paint their faces, do activities and just keep them entertained. Surprisingly this wasn’t too expensive, so if you’re having a fair few kiddies at your wedding then this would be a really good option.
FOOD
You will always get someone who moans about the food. Whether it be that the menu hasn’t considered those with dietary requirements or just because someone doesn’t like it. The food should be something that you like, if there are certain dietary requirements then by all means try and cater for these or offer an alternative. Another food related moan, is that there isn’t enough. Some weddings (none that I have been to, just so I don’t get told off) have had really small portions of food which can make guests moan about how little the portion sizes are and that they are still hungry etc. Truth of the matter is, you’ll never please everyone, but trying to negotiate different deals with vendors to try and suit the majority would definitely go a long way.
TABLE PLANS
People sometimes don’t like people, especially people they don’t know. You are guaranteed that at least one guest will moan (or whisper) about being sat on a table with people they don’t know. When planning seating arrangements, its extremely important to make sure that you consider who knows who, or if they are single or know few people who might get on with who and take it from there. Just don’t seat single people in couples to try and surprise them with a little blind date as they probably won’t appreciate it. Whatever you decide, try not to stress about it too much. After all, guests are only seated for the wedding breakfast and speeches and that’s it.
CASH BAR
Those who live in the UK, know that its not “tradition” to have an open bar. So you usually expect to take cash with you for a few – or a lot of – extra drinks to celebrate the newlyweds. Considering there are usually free bottles of wine during the wedding breakfast for guests, you will still get guests moaning about the price of drinks. I recall going to a wedding where to add a top of lemonade to my rose cost me £2.00 (uh-uh that was ridiculous) but I didn’t moan about it, I just didn’t water down my rose after that. Drink prices can vary, and there is no “set” amount for guests to take for drinks as it all depends what they drink, but to help your guests out you may wish to circulate the bar prices so nothing is a surprise on the day. If they still moan, tell them to drink water, you’re not expected to pay for all your guests to get wasted.
PHOTOGRAPHER
At weddings, its expected for the Bride and Groom to spend a good hour taking photos on the day. After all you have spent thousands of pounds making your day absolutely perfect. You have also paid for a photographer to make sure they capture everything so you can keep all the photos of memories. During the photoshoot, you will have guests mumbling about how long it takes as usually photos are taken between the ceremony and before food. One option (if you’re not too fussed about the first time your future hubby see’s you) is to do the photos before the ceremony. As our wedding is in Spain, we are going to be legally married before we fly out, even though we are not celebrating it. So we have decided to do the majority of our photos about an hour before the ceremony just to make sure we can spend as much time as possible mingling with guests and enjoying our wedding.
LOCATION
If your wedding is miles away from your local town, expect guests to moan about travelling. In my opinion, they shouldn’t moan about travelling to the wedding as they didn’t have to say yes. But even so, you’ll get people moaning about travelling to the venue and how much the taxi will be to go back home. Our wedding is in Spain so we have expected a lot of people not to be able to attend, and those who are attending we are extremely grateful for them willing to travel. But we have still have some comments about travelling to our wedding and staying in Spain as it’s costly, but the truth is, it’s your day and you need to choose the venue on what you want. All the other things will fall in place, and most important people – i.e. you, your family, your closest friends – will all be there.
We all know that we can’t please everyone, especially at weddings! It’s almost im-poss-i-ble (yes, I am saying that out loud in a French accent) but I hope pointing out some of the most popular wedding guest complaints, will help make your day as smooth and as complaint free as possible.
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