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Stations menu- how tos?

tourstoretourstore member
First Anniversary
in Wedding Cakes & Food Forum
we are thinking of stations for dinner. For those of you who did this or are planning to can you tell me... How did you do seating during the party? How long were the stations open? Was it essentially a buffet? Did everyone storm the stations at the same time? Can you share the timeline of the event? FYI: there will be a cocktail hour with food prior to entering the ballroom. Also the Dj and dancing will begin right away. I want the party to keep rocking with very little down time. Thanks for your input
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Re: Stations menu- how tos?

  • NOLAbridealmostNOLAbridealmost member
    5 Love Its Name Dropper Combo Breaker First Comment
    edited March 2012
    We did stations. The stations were open from the moment guests arrived until about 30 minutes before the end of the reception.  There was no seating chart, but there were plenty of tables and chairs (way more than the number of guests) so people could eat, mingle, move around, stay put, dance, eat more, whatever.   There were no lines at all.  We also had a fairly small wedding (around 75 guests).  We put like 9 stations in 3 clusters so it was like 3 "mini buffets" I guess. 

    Basically there were no lines because people were able to eat at their leisure throughout the night.   

    This is very typical of receptions in NOLA so guests sort of knew what was up.  I could see this style being a bit confusing if you're from an area where the seating chart/plated dinner thing is the norm. 

    If you wanted to do a seating chart as well, you could do that. I'd ask the event staff to notify guests as they are seated that the stations are open and ready to go at their leisure.  That way as people trickle in they can start sampling the food and go back for seconds, etc. without a crowd forming around the stations.

    The guests arrived about 20 minutes before we did.  They all had food by the time we got there.  Immediately after we arrived we did our first dance and the father daughter mother son dances.  The dance floor was open immediately afterwards.  The dancing didn't quite pick up for the first 30 minutes or so while people were still really in "food" mode but then the dance floor got packed and fewer people were hitting up the stations.  

    We asked our venue coordinator to bring us each a plate of food and we ate it in the 20 minute down time before arriving at the reception so that we wouldn't be completely starving during all the festivities. I still managed to eat during the reception though. =) 
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  • Maggie0829Maggie0829 member
    First Anniversary First Answer First Comment 5 Love Its
    We had stations.  The stations were open for dinner time (about two hours).  They certainly weren't stormed like a traditional buffet line since they were spread out a bit so guests chose where they wanted to go first which helped with the chaos of buffet lines.

    As for seating, we did a seating chart so people knew which tables to sit at, but that is about it.  To control the "storming of the stations" our venue staff directed a table at a time that they were welcome to the food, this way our 130 guests didn't all get up at once.

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