Wedding Day mistakes

Wedding planning is challenging and time consuming. It’s easy to make mistakes in the planning process and on the actual wedding day. Here’s some of the common mistakes couples can make on their big day.

Getting off schedule

This is perhaps the most common of wedding day mistakes to make and the one that can cause the largest number of problems. Engaged couples almost always make a detailed itinerary of the day, many times working on this with a wedding planner or a photographer. The schedule for the reception often is worked on with the DJ. Sometimes couples just make their own schedule. The problem I see is that couples don’t often realize how long things take. They don’t account for little things that might go wrong and throw a wrench into the schedule. I would safely say the vast majority of weddings fall off of their schedule in some way at some point during the day. From the photographer’s standpoint, that can cause issues with getting all required photos taken.

Keeping guests waiting

Sometimes couples keep guests waiting too long before their arrival at the reception. Many brides and grooms like to make a stop or two between the ceremony and reception. More often than not this stop involves at least one bar. I think that’s all fine and good, but I have seen too many times where the wedding parties stay too long and don’t arrive at the reception at their appointed time. As a photographer, I love to make a stop at a nice park to get some photos of the bride and groom or wedding party. However I do think it’s important for a wedding party not to stay too long at a park, at a bar or any other place they go to have the ceremony. This just leaves guests at the reception waiting for the action to begin, and you don’t want to keep them waiting too long.

Too long between ceremony and reception

Too long of a time between ceremony and reception. This is another of the wedding day mistakes that involves keeping guests waiting. However, sometimes couples intentionally have a large time gap in between the ceremony and reception. This might be due to church scheduling, but it can leave guests wondering what to do, particularly if they came from out of town. If you have a large time gap, consider some type of activity that will keep guests occupied.

Not feeding vendors

You don’t offer meals to your vendors. People like the photographer, videographer, wedding planner and DJ get hungry too. If you are serving a nice meal to your guests, remember these workers who are doing their best to make your day special. Extend a personal invitation to them to partake in the meal.

Toasts too long

You allow too many people give a toast or to speak for too long. I’ve seen this many times. It’s great to have your best man and maid of honor to give a toast, but sometimes they go just go on and on and on. It gets too long and boring. Or you allow too many people to stand up and give toasts. I suggest to leave it to the best man and maid of honor – and perhaps the fathers — and give them a time limit.