for those of you who have gotten married, when you gave your RH the final headcount, did you lowball the number? my friend who got married this sat, had 7 people not show up, who she included in her final headcount, so she was out nearly $1000. have you or would you lowball the number by a few (maybe 5). she warned me i should, and if they all come, then pay extra that day, as if too many people showed up. any thoughts? TIA!
menc
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Re: lowball the headcount
Hmmm interesting, I think they do the headcount by the placecards though.
the future mrs m
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hey there, they do the headcount by placecards -i had my e-party last sat and i did lowball teh count. thank god b/c like 12 ppl who rsvp'd didn't show! Others did, though. I would lowball it. dont put your sister's name and yourself, ppl who are close to you.
SusiBtoM
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I had to give the RH a final count, an alphabetized guest list with corresponding table assignment, and the escort cards. The RH counts everything.
If you lowball, then you have to be prepared to (1) leave out some escort cards (2) have a plan where to seat the 'extra' guests if they show up (3) have extra favors on hand (4) have cash on hand to pay for the 'extra' guests that do show up.
Will you hurt anyone's feelings if you leave them out of the count and they show up, with no escort card or table assignment ?
I had 8 no shows. As frustrating as it was, nothing we could do about it, except to take home 8 dinners and 8 desserts.
teenigrrl
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i didn't even think about having to give them the escort cards and the seating chart. if i can take the extra food home though, i guess it's not so bad. Thanks!!!
SusiBtoM
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If you want to lowball, do it by 2 people. Leave out your sister and her date, but let her know in advance. Make sure you leave a space for her at the table (seat 8 instead of 10) so that you can 'squeeze' her in , or she can take the place of someone who really doesn't show up. Maybe you can do it with a really close friend that won't be offended.
lb9977
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I have heard from a lot of people to low ball the count because you never know what will happen and at least 2 people don't show up due to any reason, but I never thought of the whole placecard table setting thing......
futrmrsblt
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they have to set up x number of chairs so they know how many.. and the placecards are put up etc id give them the real number
LIprincess
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Re: lowball the headcount
Posted by SusiBtoM
If you want to lowball, do it by 2 people. Leave out your sister and her date, but let her know in advance. Make sure you leave a space for her at the table (seat 8 instead of 10) so that you can 'squeeze' her in , or she can take the place of someone who really doesn't show up. Maybe you can do it with a really close friend that won't be offended.
Very smart... sneaky, but love it..... My sister woudl understand :)
PegaLega
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Re: lowball the headcount
I gave them my minimum, if you go over and give them a number higher then your minimum and 10 people dont show you still have to pay for that 10. We gave them our minimum so that if we went over we only had ot pay for those we were over
leahland
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absolutely. my hall even suggested i do that because once you pay, there are no refunds. i have 4 people i think may not show up. i have favors, chairs, and placecards for them. the hall will set up 7 plates at that table and if they show the hall will add the extra plates during cocktails and noone will be the wiser. most halls don't go by placecards they go by actual headcount that you give them. leah
SusiBtoM
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Re: lowball the headcount
Posted by leahland
absolutely. my hall even suggested i do that because once you pay, there are no refunds. i have 4 people i think may not show up. i have favors, chairs, and placecards for them. the hall will set up 7 plates at that table and if they show the hall will add the extra plates during cocktails and noone will be the wiser. most halls don't go by placecards they go by actual headcount that you give them. leah
I had to give my RH the headcount, the number of people at each table, which they counted to make sure it added up to the headcount, an alphabetized list of guests by table, and the escort cards which they cross referenced against the list.
tela
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I would do it with just a few people, maybe 2-3, this will still save you some money.
MrsQ-in2007
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I lowballed it and so happy I did!
We had something like 7 people not show up. That's a LOTTTT of money.
I had given the RH 8 people UNDER our actual total. We had a few extra people show up that weren't expected, so at the end of the night it worked out that we just had to pay for one person!
Since we also had to give them all the placecards, and a list of everyone's names and table numbers etc, what I ended up doing was not counting anyone who had an 'and guest' (meaning they were bringing someone whom I did not know, or have their name, etc). So on the list, it would just say John Smith, but in reality I knew it was John Smith and Guest. So I did that for one guest at each of 8 tables. So if they did show, all the RH would do is add the chair and place setting - no problem.
It won't work if you try to do this with a group of 8 friends - cuz then they'd have to like set up a table for the, and the place settings etc etc. It worked out perfectly for us.
teenigrrl
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Re: lowball the headcount
thanks for all the ideas. i'm most worried about 4 poeple coming from albany not showing up. i think i should be OK it i give 4 lower, esp if i go by the 'guest' who wasn't invited, but shows up.
