HELP! Guest count/reception locations??

[YouLoveJulianne]

Ok.. I'm kinda freaking out a little here. We are supposed to be locking in our date soon (April 20th weekend) and we're still conflicted on the locations. When we went for our site visit we narrowed down the reception locations to a few places... The Living Seas, Atlantic Dance Hall, or American Adventure Rotunda. AAR is pretty much eliminated at this point because we definetly won't meet the strict 100 person minimum.

We are now trying to decide between ADH and TLS. My DF loves TLS because it is "inside" a park.. and if we are making our guests travel all the way from NY we should at least provide them with a true "Disney expereince." I completely get his point, and I agree.. I'm just worried about the head count.

We are inviting 102 people. 11 people I already have a very strong feeling will not be attending, which brings us to 91 people. Obviously more people may also RSVP no, but I am not certain.

My concern is that both of these locations aren't really great for anything over like 70-80 people. Technically they can fit our size guest list, but I REALLY don't want the party to feel crowded!

Any advice would be great, or if you have had your wedding at either TLS or ADH and can share your experience in terms of head count and comfortability I'd greatly appreciate it.

On a side note, I've seen other brides on here do Pre-RSVPs to give them a better idea of what to expect, and possibly if they need to move to a larger or smaller location. I intend to do these when I send out my Save The Dates right after we book our date... I'm still just worried that if we do decide to move locations that they might not be available by the time we know our estimated head count.... can you tell that I'm completely stressing??!! AHHH!!! HELP!

 

[NoOrdinaryPrincess]

Your wedding is a year from now, correct?

I would go ahead and book your top choice location, and then change it later if need be. I think a "pre-RSVP" is a good idea, but you can always change later if things don't work out.

 

[lurkyloo]

Also, destination weddings have a lower response rate than local weddings. Even though it's Disney, which may actually attract more guests than, say, a Caribbean wedding, the response rate around this board seems to be at about 50%-70%. More often than not, you see numbers go down rather than up the closer the day gets.

 

[bbb1019]

Before we even sent out our save the dates, we emailed/called/texted almost everyone to get a clue to how many we should expect. We ended up inviting only ~45 because it was a destination wedding. We have received definates at around ~30. The rest of the 10-15 are older family members or extended family from my Fiance's side where he couldn't not invite them but where they have said maybe.

We visited the Living Seas, that's my reception location thus far... which I'm actually thinking of changing to an out of the park location so we can use outside vendors and save $$. It's a more intimate feel, there's no real separation between cocktail/reception if you are using it for both. But it's a beautiful space (be aware they are some ugly blue walls haha)

 

[YouLoveJulianne]

I posted the following in my PJ, but I figured I'd get more views and therefore comments/suggestions/lovely advice from you lovely girls by putting it in the main thread. I realize that it's a very lengthy post, so god bless you if you read through it all!

HELP! I need some serious advice ladies! (Not sure if I should post this here or on the main thread page)

The other night I was sitting around with Paul, my mom, & my brother and the topic of the guest list came up. Here's our problem... our guest list is at around 105 (give or take a few) people. We are IN LOVE with SBP for the ceremony. It's the only location that we both absolutely LOVED from the beginning and agree on 100%. Those of you who do not know, SBP has a very strict maximum of 80 people. Also, our reception location that we want is LSS which is not a huge area. It has provided seating for about 84 people, any more and we'll have to add table to a space that is already slightly tight (IMO).

Here's the question posed:

Someone mentioned that we can say that the wedding is adults only (ages 15/16 and up). If we did that then we'd definitely be under our numbers and be able to keep the venues that we want. My uneasiness with this is that many people will be coming in from out of town. How can we invite people to a wedding "in Disney" and not invite the kids. (I know that Disney has a babysitting service that I can recommend to all of my guests with kids, but I still feel kind of bad. I know that many people don't feel comfortable leaving their kids with people that they don't know).

Here's what we are considering: We'll do an adults-only wedding, and then a kids-only (accompanied by at least one of their parents of coarse) breakfast with the characters the next day at Chef Mickey's. This way, we will at least have an event for the kids (that they would actually be into).

Second question: I plan on doing Pre-RSVP's with the save the date's that I will be sending out as soon as we get our date confirmed in a couple of weeks. If we get more "no's" than expected we may not even need to do this crazy kid-ban. How early do I need to let people know that we may be considering doing adults-only? I was thinking that on the pre-rsvp I can include a sentence that states "For your information, due to strict venue capacities one or more of the events may be adults-only, however it is too early in the process to know if this will be necessary." Then, if we realize that we will have to do adults-only, I can post it on our wedding website, and explain everything in detail with a newsletter or something like that.

Ugh.. I'm like stressing! Please tell me that someone else has gone through this before! What did you do?! Any advice would be greatly appreciated! (keep in mind that the budget is not really an issue, that's not why we need to cut down the list, it's because we want to keep the specific locations).

Thank you!

 

[MrsRomance]

Here's what we are considering: We'll do an adults-only wedding, and then a kids-only (accompanied by at least one of their parents of coarse) breakfast with the characters the next day at Chef Mickey's. This way, we will at least have an event for the kids (that they would actually be into).

I think this may be dangerous ground. You are in a sense asking people to pay for a destination wedding, and then for those that have children, where will they go during the 'adults only wedding'? I would assume that their parents would have to pay for childcare at WDW which can be quite expensive. I just don't know if people would be willing to pay to travel down to your wedding, and have that kind of expense on top.

 

[insight blue]

My friend had her reception at Atlantic Dance Hall a few years ago. They invited over 200 people, and something close to 150 came. There was plenty of room for everybody! Alot of larger tables were on the main floor, but then they sat people at the smaller tables towards the edges, but still on the first floor. They had their cocktail hour on the second floor. It was a really great place, so fun, and had plenty of room for everybody. So you should have no problem with 90 people.

 

[YouLoveJulianne]

I think this may be dangerous ground. You are in a sense asking people to pay for a destination wedding, and then for those that have children, where will they go during the 'adults only wedding'? I would assume that their parents would have to pay for childcare at WDW which can be quite expensive. I just don't know if people would be willing to pay to travel down to your wedding, and have that kind of expense on top.

I agree with you.. This is why I have such apprehension about it, hence the tension and stress! lol
I guess I should wait for the pre-RSVP's to start coming in before I get stressed. It's just so hard to try and think of how you're going to plan out the day with the uncertainty of the guest count.

 

[SheriBerry]

I think you will be fine, whether you choose LSS or ADH. We were married last year and had our reception at ADH. We invited 135 and only at 74 guests RSVP that they were coming. We were ble to fit everyone on the dance floor and it did not feel crowded at all. Hope this helps!

 

[Ash8716]

We had our reception at ADH with 85 people. The place is huge you will not feel crowded. The only thing to keep in mind is that you probably won't have all your guests on the dance floor. Some will have to be at tables of four on the outside of the dance floor. We did 6 rounds on the floor, a head table and then 3 tables of 3 or 4 people on the outside. None of us really liked this idea at first but we were convinced that it is done all the time. We put our friends at these tables and they could care less. They probably had more fun there! Plus at ADH nobody stays at their table! Depending on your budget you can pay $2500 to remove the small round tables and put 8-10 person round tables in their place. Our planner told us they have only had one bride actually do that though.

As for your fiances feeling of having the reception in the theme park. I know exactly what you mean! We wanted something unique since our guests were coming all the way from CT. We didn't want to just use a ballroom like we could at home. ADH is totally unique, you are basically renting out a night club plus you can actually see EPCOT from the balconies!! Our guests were so amazed by the location and had a blast. We actually had Living Seas for our welcome dinner because it was too cold to have it in our original spot outside at France. It is an awesome location but there is a lot less room there than at ADH especially if your guests like to dance. ADH already has the DJ area and dance floor set up. Have you thought about a DP so your guests can do something inside the park?

 

[YouLoveJulianne]

We had our reception at ADH with 85 people. The place is huge you will not feel crowded. The only thing to keep in mind is that you probably won't have all your guests on the dance floor. Some will have to be at tables of four on the outside of the dance floor. We did 6 rounds on the floor, a head table and then 3 tables of 3 or 4 people on the outside. None of us really liked this idea at first but we were convinced that it is done all the time. We put our friends at these tables and they could care less. They probably had more fun there! Plus at ADH nobody stays at their table! Depending on your budget you can pay $2500 to remove the small round tables and put 8-10 person round tables in their place. Our planner told us they have only had one bride actually do that though.

As for your fiances feeling of having the reception in the theme park. I know exactly what you mean! We wanted something unique since our guests were coming all the way from CT. We didn't want to just use a ballroom like we could at home. ADH is totally unique, you are basically renting out a night club plus you can actually see EPCOT from the balconies!! Our guests were so amazed by the location and had a blast. We actually had Living Seas for our welcome dinner because it was too cold to have it in our original spot outside at France. It is an awesome location but there is a lot less room there than at ADH especially if your guests like to dance. ADH already has the DJ area and dance floor set up. Have you thought about a DP so your guests can do something inside the park?

Yes! We are DEFINITELY doing an Illuminations DP! I also fell in love with the balconies at ADH... I just feel kinda bad, because DF likes LSS better!
If we get more pre-rsvp's than expected I may call the planner and switch us to ADH.