GF Bridal Tea - New BUYOUT / Hours - Other Ideas?

[PaulnJulia]

Hello - Wanted to share an update, especially with Carrie since it differs from most recent version of her e-book.

Just talked to the Gardenview Tea Room:

Hours are now STRICTLY 10-12 instead of 11-1.

Minimum buyout for ANY TIME is $2500. No longer do they have a lower buyout in the morning.

Pretty hard to spend $2500 at $35 a pop....75 people! We aren't having that many at the wedding!

Any other ideas of something nice?

Thanks

 

[aristocatz]

How many guests are you having? Are you deadset on having the entire restaurant to yourselves? If you book it early enough during public seating time (i.e. right at 10), you might end up being the only ones in there anyways without having to pay the minimum.

Otherwise, you might look into Mizner's Lounge for maybe apps & wine? I know a bride on here had Mizners for I think cocktail hour & I *thought* they were reasonably priced & easy to work with?? Bride's name is Joanne & she had a Swan wedding.

 

[PaulnJulia]

How many guests are you having? Are you deadset on having the entire restaurant to yourselves? If you book it early enough during public seating time (i.e. right at 10), you might end up being the only ones in there anyways without having to pay the minimum.

Otherwise, you might look into Mizner's Lounge for maybe apps & wine? I know a bride on here had Mizners for I think cocktail hour & I *thought* they were reasonably priced & easy to work with?? Bride's name is Joanne & she had a Swan wedding.

Thanks for the idea, but they wanted a tea...there is special significance for the bride, her mother and grandmother.

The public tea doesn't start until 2 pm on a Saturday, so that timing won't likely work. Rehearsal is likely getting scheduled for 4 or 5 pm.

The public tea can't have any "speeches" or gift sharing. That is where she was going to give her bridesmaids their gifts. We could do that at the rehearsal dinner perhaps. But the timing is what really kills it for her....

 

[lurkyloo]

I just uploaded a brand-new version of the book to the PassPorter store a few minutes ago, so you can go get your free update now.

Is the problem just that you don't have enough people to reach a $2,500 minimum at the tea room? Or is it the $2,500 price tag? Because your planner can arrange a private tea for you at the GF Convention Center, Marina, Summerhouse, etc. It would probably be in the same neighborhood, cost-wise, yet free of the time restrictions.

 

[tinkerbell 766]

Hi sweetie
It was me who had a cocktail hour in Mizner's. It was very informal and we only did a few appetisers and drinks as we were following up with dinner at Citrico's. When I contacted the manager at Citrico's about dinner, I mentioned that we wanted a cocktail hour at Mizner's and the Citrico's manager arranged the appetisers for me. I think maybe (though I am not entirely sure), that, at the time, Mizner's and Citrico's had the same management team.
As far as drinks were concerned, we had no pre-ordered drinks or cocktails arranged. We set up a running tab at the bar and I designed and printed out 'drink's tickets' for my guests. I think each guest had two tickets to get drinks of their choice from the bar, and all those drinks were just charged to us at the end. I gave the bar staff samples of these tickets so they knew what they looked like and also printed out 'non-alcoholic' tickets for the guests under 21 years old.
It worked very well for us, and we were very lucky that the GF band was playing all the time we were having our cocktail hour in Mizner's. Perfect!!!

I also had a bridal tea the day before our VR at the Garden View tearoom. We just had the public tea as there were just 8 of us. I had gifts for my ladies, but just gave them out in the GF lobby before the tea. The ladies carried their gift bags into tea with them and nobody seemed to care a jot!!!
We did no speeches as these were done the day after at the cake and champagne reception at the Swan and also during dinner at Citrico's. HTH xxx