RSVP card question

Fuschiablu

So, this might be a dumb question, but having never hosted such a big event I figured I'd ask all of you ladies.

 We are having a plated dinner for our reception. I know from having RSVP'd to other such weddings that we need to ask guests to let us know which meal (chicken, beef, vegetarian, etc) they would like for dinner. What I don't know is how to decipher which meal which person would like. Like if I send an invitation to a married couple and they reply that they will both attend and request one chicken entree and one beef entree how should I structure the RSVP card so that I know which of them ordered which meal. For the life of me I can't remember how this has been done on invitations that I've recieved before. I'm sure there is some ettiquette on this out there somwhere. Any advice you have would be great!

ecsmiles

You could have a line for them to initial, or personalize the RSVP cards with each name and then next to their name a place to check which meal - the latter would also relieve you (maybe) of people RSVPing with more people than were invited.

mandybear7

We left a line next to each meal choice and wrote "Please initial a dinner option." PIB

mariarpost

You may want to query your reception venue to see how they decipher which meals to feed which guests.  For example, the event coordinator at my reception venue only needs to know how many of each meal go to each table.  I guess the servers inquire who selected what meal as the entrees are served.  Chances are that couples who RSVP jointly will be seated at the same table any way, so if your venue needs only a per-table count as opposed to a per-person preference, it may not really matter.  On the other hand, if your reception venue asks that you use some kind of coding system on your escort cards, you will need to know who, specifically, ordered what meal. In that case, having each guest initial his or her preference is a good idea.

squirrly

PIB of our RSVP cards.  I pre-printed names on them with checkboxes for which entree.  I needed to know who had which one, and it prevents writein guests, too.