I went to our wedding venue today with my OH's parents for our planning meeting to discuss details etc. We had a huge Word document to fill out with information about the day so the meeting can go ahead with details re times / food / drinks / evening reception / details / supplier details. My OH couldn't come as he was in work. We could have done a telephone meeting but we decided I'd go with his parents. The meeting was quite shocking.
The planning lady we met was (to put it in the words of my future mum-in-law) "a bit bossy". Details that we'd discussed on our initial visits to the venue to look at it and also on booking the venue seemed to have suddenly changed re several things:
1) Drinks reception. We were planning on offered 2 glasses of Pimms / 2 glasses of orange juice for guests. The planner today said that she likes to add bottled water as an option for the drinks reception in the gardens.... WHY!??!?! Then she also suggested a Peroni option for the men who didn't fancy Pimms. Quite a good idea as we'd thought of this. This would mean Peroni / Pimms / orange juice. WHY ADD BOTTLED WATERD?!?!?! 3 options are more than enough aren't they?
2) Location of the bar. She told us the bar would be in the main room with the disco / tables / reception rather than in the bar room next door. We had been told we could have a larger bar in the third ajoining room. There are 3 rooms - why cram everything into one???? We also asked if bar could be open before wedding breakfast so people could buy different drinks if they didn't fancy wine. Got told this afternoon that a minimum £100 spend required to do this & that it "would be virtually impossible to spend this". We have 74 guests - quite easy to spend £100 isn't it?? She also wanted us to put jugs of Peroni on the side for guests to have if they didn't want wine. We'd have to pick up this tab even though we're giving people 1/2 bottle of wine each with dinner.
3) Chocolate fountain. The location has been moved to the bar room. Nothing else would be in there apart from this. It's quite a small room really so a big choc fountain and guests will be cramped! She also went on about how all the weddings with choc fountains meant curtains in the venue would get covered and need cleaning. They ask for a £300 cleaning deposit - which we are happy about. But she was insistent our guests would get chocolate smeared (her actual words) all over the place. Our guests are not animals and we have 2 children (well they are 15 years old and mature) only attending.
4) Top table. We decided on a traditional long table. She said that 99% of weddings there have a round top table as it's more fun. We want a long top table. Not a round one. I said I would talk the option over with OH but she kept going on and on about the stupid round table! I respect people if they want a round table and it's a personal choice (no offence to ladies on here who are doing round top table) but we really would prefer tradition.
Come home tonight to tell OH the details after he's had a really tough day at work. He's now in a right stinking mood saying how he should have come along and that it's our wedding and that everything is changed! So I'm going to have to email this woman Monday to get these things straightened out! What should have been a great meeting to go over details has now turned into chaos!
How can I put it delicately to the woman in an email Monday morning? Should I just come out with how disapointed I was coming away from the meeting? Should me and OH organise a telephone meeting or just deal through emails??
Sorry for the whinging ladies but need to get this off my chest!
