As you are planning for your upcoming wedding, there are some wedding guest faux pas you’ll want avoid. While you’ll rarely hear about any issues that your guests encountered during your wedding there might be some mild annoyances that you can avoid when planning for your wedding. We want everyone, including you, to enjoy every moment of your wedding, so we’ve made a quick list of missteps to avoid.

Table Assignments

If you are thinking of forgoing table and seating assignments altogether, we have one word for you, don’t. It’s very stressful for your guests to try to figure out where to sit and places a huge strain on the catering staff. We suggest opting for an easy to read seating chart and escort cards to keep the night moving along. We have a great example of an escort card display shown here.

Timing Issues

Once cocktail hour is over, you’ll want to get the reception started right away. We advise to start dinner service within 30 minutes of your guests taking their seat. It’s been a long day for everyone, so you’ll want to avoid cranky guests by serving food early in the reception.

Speeches

Nothing causes more disinterest than speeches that are too long. While you’ll want to limit speeches to no more than five, in total, you’ll also want to keep them short. We like to recommend that speeches are less than five minutes in length to keep guests attentive.

Music Selection

Everyone has different taste in music and while you’ll want to cater to your music tastes, you’ll also want to make sure everyone is comfortable with your music selections. Choose songs that are a mixture of tempos and genres. This will keep people on the dance floor all night. One of our preferred partners, Second Song, does at mixing genres.

Long Lines

Long lines are probably one of the biggest frustrations for your wedding guests. No wedding guest wants to miss something like the cake cutting because they were stuck in line at the bathroom. Scout out the nearest restrooms to your reception location and make sure there are clear directions, so your guests know their options. We also advise to splurge for the extra bartender if you have a heavy drinking crowd to keep the line at the bar to a minimum.

Worried about some other missteps? It’s always best to talk through the flow of your wedding with your planner. They’ll be able to share best practices to keep both you and your wedding guests happy on your big day to avoid your own wedding guest faux pas.