Rowdy Guests - How to Handle Them by A.B. Monk
Guests can make or break your entire wedding experience. All it takes is one rowdy guest who drinks too much and thinks they should dance on the tabletops to take your lovely reception from classy to trashy. But it is your special day and you don’t want to have to be running all over the place to make sure your many guests behave themselves and still have a good time. So what do you do?
- The first and most obvious choice is to enlist your wedding party’s help. Instruct them to head off any trouble before it starts. If they notice a guest who is drinking too much, they should go talk to them and get them to calm down on the alcohol. With your wedding party patrolling the crowd, you can relax and trust that they have things under control.
- However, if you’re having a big wedding and you don’t think your wedding party can handle it all on their own, hire a security detail. They can watch the crowd for any sign of disturbance and move in before the situation gets out of hand. With a security detail you can feel confident that your entire reception is being taken care of by professional staff.
- If you can’t afford a security detail and you still don’t think your wedding party can handle any awkward situations, consider not having any alcohol served at your affair. Most often the problem guests are the guests who drink too much. Serve delightful non-alcoholic cocktails instead of having an open bar. Or a sherbet punch instead of a champagne punch. It’ll also save you a lot of money, since alcohol is so expensive.
One of the wedding planners pet peeves is dealing with unruly guests at the reception. It would be very embarrassing to have the proprietor of the reception venue evict your great-uncle Joe because he was being rowdy. Or to have your wedding planner ask people to leave. It would take the focus off you and your special day and all most people would be able to talk about, when remembering your wedding, would be how awful it was that people were asked to leave. So, take the initiative and make sure your guests are under control. You definitely don’t want to relive wedding horror stories at family reunions or risk offending any of your guests, even though they may not be as courteous to you, by not respecting the reception venue.
(Photo: Lorissa Shepstone)
A.B. Monk is a graduate from the University of Tennessee. She has had a tumultuous few years and she is finally getting back on her feet. You can visit her website at www.spiniffy.com. She has agreed to be a regular columnist at All Things Girl, with her thoughts running mostly (but not always) to weddings.
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December 13th, 2007 at 3:59 pm
My soon-to-be brother-in-law often drinks too much at family events and gets out of control and starts arguments. We are getting married in the summer of 2008, and I am already losing sleeps over him cause problem. we are having open bar. We have concidered hiring a security guard, but we still think that would be distrubtive. Please send advice on how to best handle this situation.