I absolutely love when a couples tells me they are having an after party! 5 hours just doesn’t seem like enough time to celebrate your love for each other with your friends and family. Here’s what you need to think of during your after party, food, booze, and music.
Music. You MUST have music. If you can’t afford to extend your DJ or band. An iPad or iPhone will do just fine! Add your favorite tunes to your Spotify play list and just hit play and let the playlist do all the work. Personally I love the playlist route, because you can just dance the night away to all your favorites!
Booze. Don’t feel obligated to extend your bar package. Talk to your venue and see if you can do a tabulated bar where you only pay for the drinks consumed. It’s also totally appropriate to have a cash bar where your guests pay for their own drinks. You can also consider having a limited bar for the after party. Just doing beer or wine or just a simple speciality cocktail. There are so many possibilities. So talk to your venue and see what works best for your budget.
Food. Think sweet and salty for your after party. Try to have the food brought our midway through your after party. Weddings traditionally end with the cake being served towards the later part of the wedding. So your guests will not be super hungry when the after party first begins. This is also a good way to save on your budget. Traditionally most people will join the first part of the after party and then head out. So by serving the food midway this eliminates how many people you have to feed. Heres some of my favorite ideas.
Talk to your baker to see if they would offer a mini cookie and milkshake bar or even a doughnut hole.
See If your venue can do mini sliders or even chicken and waffles.
Bring in a food truck. Think of all your favorite salty greasy foods. Fries, Pretzels, mini grilled cheeses, and of course Pizza! Ice cream trucks are my favorite of course.
If you love fast food you can coordinate bringing in some happy meals, or even all your favorite chipotle things!
