Planning a Cocktail Style Wedding - Misconceptions, What you Need, Budget and More
Increasingly popular, cocktail style wedding receptions are an informal, social gathering of your nearest and dearest without all the formalities of a tranditional sit down wedding.
We’re doing a deep dive into all the ins and outs – from those very prevalent misconceptions, figuring out whether this style is really for you (and your budget), and what you need to think about.
Let’s get into it!
The Biggest Misconceptions
It’s cheaper
The easiest misconception is that cocktail style wedding is cheaper – sadly, not the case! They can tend to be more costly depending on your other choices. From a styling and hire point of view, they are more expensive as lounging, cocktail furniture is a larger hire price than your standard dining table and dining chairs. Most venues will have these items as part of their venue fee also, so your furniture hire will be a cost you wouldn’t incur otherwise.
If you are opting for food truck style catering to go hand-in-hand with the casual and social feel of cocktail style, then this can lower your overall budget. Typical spend per person for guests can be $110-130 on the day, and a food truck style can lower this to about half (again – this completely depends on the type of food). Typically you will find more alcohol is consumed with cocktail style, as guests can freely move during all aspects of all the formalities.
We’ve found it all evens out – so any cost savings in one area are taken up in another. Choosing cocktail style wedding should be based on the format being more “you”.
We don’t have to seat everyone
This is correct – but you do need to seat 70-80% of your guests. We recommend 70% at the very least, with the recommended at 80%.
Taking into consideration that your guests are likely to be with you for a whopping 7-8 hours, and if you’re only willing to have seats for 50% of them, then this means a lot of guests will never be able to sit down at all at your wedding. Que aching legs, backs and a sparse dancefloor. It does alter the overall vibe of the day – and guest comfort is such a high priority.
We’ve only ever styled one wedding where the couple were adamant to seat less than the 70% minimum, and we saw about 20% of guests leave after the main formalities (just before, or just after the band started). It’s a long time to expect people to stand around for without finding a perch.
It’s much easier as it’s casual
It certainly is a more relaxed vibe – and we are here for it! Planning wise, it isn’t easier – so bare in mind that there is much more planning and styling decisions that go into cocktail than a seated reception.
At a seated reception, you typically have to think about your table styling and place settings and these are replicated for all tables and guests. For cocktail style, you have a range of furniture and “zones” – from lounging spaces that need rugs, cushions, throws and then candles and floral for coffee and side tables – to smaller round cocktail tables and then longer leaners. Keeping the styling (and the furniture choices for each of these) is key – and what’s more, where does the furniture all get placed at the venue to also allow for easy guest flow throughout the day and night?
This is where we highly recommend booking in a Styling Consultation with us (you can do this below). Not only have we done this for years, we are thorough on what we suggest based on your guests, venue and your budget. It takes all the guesswork out of it for you and if we’re setting up and styling on the day of – part of this is also providing venue plan. We do it all – so you don’t need to think about it!
Furniture – how much you need and what you need to think about
The golden rule is to have seats available for 80% of your guests for a 6+ hour event. Anything less risks guests getting very uncomfortable and fatigued for long periods if they’re having to be on their feet for so long, and that doesn’t bring the carefree, fun vibes we want to create a memorable day!
You’ll need to think about the different types of furniture needed and this will be dictated by your venue and the space you have available, aswell as who your guests are and their own needs.
When styling a wedding, we always include various types of seating. This not only ticks all the boxes for your guests needs, but it also visually looks best with a range of seating options and styling of all the furniture. We want to understand who your guests are, so we can anticipate how they will move throughout your venue and also whether we need to tweak some of the furniture options to better suit the ages and requirements of your guests.
For example, one cocktail style wedding we styled last year had a number of older guests such as grandparents and even a great-grandparent. We swapped out some cocktail tables to make another lounging area aswell as a dining table and chairs. This gave guests more options that wouldn’t see them trying to pull themselves up on to cocktail chair, with something more intentional for their comfort.
Some quick fire points:
Aim to seat 80% of guests
When choosing cocktail chairs for your leaners, consider those with higher backs for more support over shorter backs or stools.
Sofas and armchairs are at different seated heights. Some are at knee-height, which make it easy to sit and get up out of (our Brooklyns, Lucy and Hamptons), and others are a little lower (such as our Manhattans).
Don’t gloss over dining tables and chairs for cocktail seating. We love incorporating these as they are offer support and practicality (plus they work out cheaper per seat than any other furniture combos).
What furniture do I need?
We’re known for styling cocktail receptions well, and we love using a range of furniture that serves purpose – both aesthetically and that is comfortable and functional.
You want to think of the different types of seating, we use a mix of:
Lounging - sofas and armchairs, accompanied by coffee and side tables, rugs and cushions
Cocktail tables – round smaller high-top tables which seat 2-3 people
Bar Leaners, also called Dry Bars – long, rectangular high-top tables which seat 6-8 people
Café Tables – small tables which seat 3-4 people
Dining Tables – round or rectangular tables which seat 8-10 people
If you have 100 guests, you’re aiming to seat 80. For most weddings with no particular guest requirements, this is our matrix and we’ve listed it by most expensive per seat, to least:
Lounging areas seating 4-5 (3 sets)
Cocktail round tables and 3 cocktail chairs (6 sets)
Bar leaners/rectangular dry bars and 6-8 chairs or stools (4 sets)
Dining tables and 8-10 chairs (2 sets)
Budget wise, just for hire for the above you’d budget between $3200 - $4000 incl GST
What else do I need to consider?
Your budget
We touched on this above, but worth mentioning again! We have worked with a number of clients in the past who were set on cocktail style, and they had to re-look at their budget to make things work, while others moved to a seated wedding to keep their costs more manageable for their circumstances. If you’re unsure, our biggest suggestion is to book in a planning meeting with us to go through all of these scenarios and come armed with your budget. We will walk you through this and weave out what your priorities are, what you can make work and how best to spend your budget.
Educate your guests
Your guests may not be familiar with the style of event, so they may feel a little lost on what the formalities are (if any). We highly recommend having an ‘Order of the Day’ on your wedding website, aswell as a printed large sign so guests can feel at ease knowing what is happening next.
Timings on the day
While more casual typically, you still need a flow of the day – there are usually still speeches, cutting of the cake and first dances. You can pick and choose what you want to do on your day (just like seated). Having that structure and runsheet is still super important so don’t skip this.
We also find more of our couples are opting for an on-the-day wedding coordinator to keep this more in check, as it can be a little more loose with cocktail style. We offer this service also, so you can well assured you’re taken care of!
Conclusion
Cocktail style is a social, intimate style that really digs into connecting with others. Your guests have more time to mingle, chat and create more experiences on the day (I tried hard not to say “making memories” as it’s so clique – but it’s also so true)!
There is more thought and planning that goes into this style, but it is well worth the result.
If you’re struggling or just need a sounding board to go through your plans and timings then please reach out to us. We have such a rich expertise in this style and we’d love to connect and sit down with you. You can book in a planning consultation here, or reach out here.