5 Questions to Consider When Booking Your Reception

5 questions to ask yourself when looking for a wedding reception location:

1. Will our guests need a place to stay the night of the reception? If you are having lots of guests from out of town you may want to consider having your reception at a hotel to maximize their time at your reception especially if you are hosting alcohol.

2. How far do you want your guests to drive between the ceremony location and the reception location? It might be best to choose a reception location that is close to your ceremony location to minimize the chance of your guests getting lost on their way to the reception. If you do choose a location that is a bit of a drive you may want to consider including a map for your guests.

3. How involved in the flow of the night do you want to be? If you want a little less stress you may want to consider choosing a location that has an event manager that will take care of the food coming out on time and the overall flow of the reception.

4. What type of environment do you want for your reception? If you want something romantic, you may want to consider a location that is a little cozy and close. You need to make sure there is space for everyone but you don’t want there to be too much open space. 

5. Do you want plated meals or a buffet line? Buffet lines take up more space but can be more cost effective with some vendors. If you want a buffet line, you need to make sure you have space for the line.

 

Hilton Garden Inn - Johnston, IA

My Story:

When my fiancé and I began looking at reception locations we weren’t sure what we wanted. Our first option was a free location that we could get through our wedding ceremony location. It was a large space that was multi-functional. The issue for us with this location was that we wanted to have a romantic environment. We decided it would be a lot of work to make a large space feel romantic. We began looking at hotel ballrooms. Our thought with this was that I would have almost all of my family coming in from out of town needing a place to stay. We also wanted someone that would take care of the overall flow of the night without having to worry about it. We were cautious of choosing a location that would be easy to get to from the ceremony location. Our locations ended up being 5 minutes away from each other. We really wanted to do plated meals to maximize our space in the ballroom.