Receiving Line

We would like to do a receiving line outside of the church. How much time should we budget for this. We are planning on having about 200 guests.

It depends somewhat on you and your guests and how much they each stop to talk with you. You can move it along more quickly by stopping someone who wants to chat by saying you will talk more with them later, etc. (and then be sure you do.) Also, the fewer people you have standing in the receiving line, the less time it will take your guests to walk through it. Don't have bridesmaids or lots of family members in the line with you. If the weather is not nice, many guests will hurry through or skip it altogether. Depending on weather, you may consider having the receiving line at the reception site instead.

But in any event, if each guest took 10 seconds average it would be a little over a half-hour total. You know some will take more than that, so you should figure 45 minutes to an hour to get 200 guests through a receiving line.