Wedding Entertainment for Guests Who Don't Dance

Almost every wedding has the same soft spot: the two or three hours between the ceremony and the evening reception, while the couple is off having photographs taken. There is a drinks reception, and then there is a long stretch where a good third of your guests are standing about being politely bored.

It is also the part of the day that gets planned last and budgeted for least.

Who actually needs entertaining

Not the friends who will be on the dancefloor at eleven. They are fine. It is:

• Anyone over about sixty
• Teenagers, who will otherwise spend the entire afternoon on their phones
• Guests who do not know anybody except the person they came with
• Dads. Universally, dads.

An activity that gives those people something to do — and, crucially, something to talk about — changes the feel of the whole afternoon.

What works outdoors between the ceremony and dinner

• Lawn games. Giant Jenga, croquet, boules. Cheap, always work, but purely passive.
• A target activity. Airsoft range, archery, clay shooting simulators. Competitive, short turns, and it draws exactly the guests who would otherwise be sitting down. Grandad shooting against the bride's teenage cousin is reliably one of the photographs people remember.
• A photo activity that is not a photo booth — a Polaroid guestbook, or a roaming photographer with a printer.
• Food that arrives slowly. Ice cream, a cheese table, doughnuts at four o'clock. Gives people a reason to move.

What tends not to work: anything needing a long briefing, anything people have to change clothes for, and anything so loud it fights the drinks reception.

Practicalities for a wedding venue

Marquee and barn venues are the easy case — there is usually lawn going spare. Check three things with your venue before booking anything:

• Whether they permit external suppliers, and whether they charge for the privilege
• What insurance they require (ours is £2 million, and we supply the certificate)
• Where the supplier can park and set up without appearing in the photographs

Our range needs a flat 10m × 4m, no power and no water, and it is fully enclosed, so it is discreet and it survives a shower. Setup takes under an hour and we can be built and quiet before guests arrive.

Cost

Events and parties start at £250 all-inclusive. In wedding terms that is less than most florists' delivery charge, for the bit of the day that usually gets nothing at all.

One thought worth having: an activity in the gap is often better value than more drinks in the gap, because it gives your guests something to remember rather than something to recover from.