Outsourcing

We rented all of that from an event rental company in our town.

We also rented from a company near our venue. I’ve had to get tables, chairs, linens, place settings, garment rack.

View Quoted Comment Do they usually help you figure out what you need? & did you find it more expensive having to get things separate? I feel like it might be less expensive if the caterer provides that for us.

View Quoted Comment I went to the showroom with my wedding planner and picked everything out and looked at all the options. There’s a range of prices depending on what you pick. I feel like caterers usually just have basic stuff and not a ton of options. Ours was expensive but that’s because of what I picked out. I got gold flatware with black handles and gold rimmed chargers and nicer linens etc. I think going directly thru the rental company might be cheaper than thru a caterer because there’s no upcharge but I could be wrong.

We rented linens and chair cushions from one company (La Tavola), and chargers, gold flats ware and a few specialty items from another (Encore Events). Worked great!

We also did rentals from an event company. We actually got linens and napkins from one place, plates from another, and my mom ended up buying all the silverware (loose, from Walmart - not the fanciest, but certainly just as nice as the rental company options) because it was cheaper. We ended up doing cans/bottles and plastic cups, just because the way the bar was setup, it would have been difficult to wash glasses and I didn't want to have to rent enough glassware to accommodate people all night with no re-use.

How do I know how much to get? My wedding is small so we have a guest count of 45 including my fiance and myself. Do I get twice as much stuff or how does that work?

View Quoted Comment Tell the rental company what your menu is and menu style is and they can help. Usually it’s one of everything but for example you may have two forks for each guest—a salad fork and a meal fork. You may have a water glass and a wine glass for each guest.

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Thank you so much for the Walmart idea! I looked it up and it is a lot cheaper to buy them loose. Even getting nicer ones is cheaper than renting nicer ones.

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Thank you! I'll send them our menu and hopefully they can let me know everything I need.

Thanks everyone for all your help!!!

If you have a wedding planner or DOC, ask them for some reputable companies in the area or who have worked with your caterer or venue. Also ask the caterer or venue who they recommend.

View Quoted Comment You’re welcome! Vendors are experts at this stuff and love to be helpful.