Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Venue Q&As

As M and I will be having dinner at a potential venue Saturday night, I figured having a list of questions ready would be smart...

Can we bring our own cake? Do they deal with the clean up? When can we decorate? Will we have the entire restaurant?

Real Simple Magazine has a great checklist to use as a starting point.

Advice/suggestions/stories are always welcome!

3 comments:

  1. Also some other's I've considered:
    Do you permit a live band/is there space for a live band? What about a DJ/sound system/etc...?

    What time can we arrive to begin set up? Do we have access to the restaurant/space all day the day of our wedding?

    Is there a catering host/person to help with the 'day of' scheduling? Who is my 'go-to' person for the day of?

    Catering menu? Bar menu? If we do wine and beer, what about a 'signature' coctail? (Are you doing an open bar?? If so, maybe think about what type of liquor might be available for guests.)

    Is the price negotiable? I.e. if the venue charges a room fee on top of the catering/bar costs, maybe you can negotiate getting rid of the room fee knowing you will be spending X dollars in total (this is what we did for our venue...and they agreed!)

    I'll see if I can come up with more questions...to be continued ;-)

    -L.

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  2. Oh my goodness....I just typed an entire response and *poof* it was gone when I clicked "post". Well here goes again:

    1) How soon can we get into the space day-of our wedding?

    2) Is there a place to store a cake, flowers, decorations, prior to the day-of?

    3) Catering menu/bar menu? Can we bring our own alcohol? If yes, is there a corking fee for each bottle of wine/beer?

    4) Is there a go-to person, catering manager, etc. that we can work with for day-of? Who will be helping us organzie the space on that day?

    5) Is there space for a band/DJ/what are your recommendations for this venue?

    6) What is the transporation situation? Will there be ample spots for people to park/taxi stand/etc/?

    7) Is there a room rental fee on top of food/beverages? If so, maybe you can negotiate getting rid of the room fee if you can guarantee you will spend X dollars on food/beverages in the course of the evening. We did this for our venue, and got room fee dropped entirely!

    If I think of more questions, I'll be sure to 'post' more...

    L.

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  3. You rock my world 'coffeygirl' :)
    Those all ALL great questions!
    Am adding them to the list!
    S.

    ReplyDelete