Fun Ways to Release Tables of Contents

Choosing the best way to release your wedding tables is an opportunity to create something fun and unique for your guests. We understand that your wedding day should be about celebrating your love and that is why you invited so many guests to help you do just that. Usually one of the most expensive and something that can make or break your wedding is catering, and rightfully so. You want to make sure that your friends and family have a great time, and since your celebration is 5+ hours, you need to make sure that everyone is fed and happy about the experience.

Before we understand if you need to release tables, you will need to decide the type of meal you want to serve your guests: sit-down, family-style, or buffet. The former 2 are in some cases a little pricier, but allows your guests to stay at their table as the plates are brought out to them, or in a way that allows the guests to serve themselves right at the table. Buffets are usually more cost effective and have a wider variety of choices for your guests. To make sure that the line doesn’t get out of control, the DJ or Wedding Planner will need to facilitate how to release tables to the buffet. 

Release Tables

Typically, there is a seating chart with each guest assigned to a table with a number or a name. The couple can have a sweetheart table for just the two of them, a head table joined with their wedding party, or a full head table adding in the wedding party’s significant others.

The sweetheart/head table is the first to be released to the buffet, followed by the couples parents’ tables or VIPs. Then the DJ or Wedding Planner will walk up to each table to give them permission to head over to the buffet table along with any instructions i.e. needing to bring their plate with them. This is the most efficient way to release the tables; however, if you are looking for more engaging activities to include in your wedding day, our Epik Weddings DJs are happy to help release the tables in a fun and delightful way. We have outlined our top 5 fun ways to release tables to the buffet at your wedding. 

Assign a Recognizable Song to the Table Name

[ps2id id=’song’ target=”/]If you are a lover of music and you want to have some fun to release the tables, one idea is to work with your DJ to help create a playlist of songs that will be used to release tables. First you will want to understand how many tables you have, then in which order you would like to have the DJ release tables. Then you can give the songs in the proper order to your DJ to create a playlist to be used to release the tables.

The table names can be the title and artist, or you can have a separate sign for each table with the title and artist. The key is to have recognizable songs and the DJ will explain the rules to your guests. When the guests of the table hear their song, they know that is their queue to head to the buffet table. To make it more engaging, the guests can dance their way to the buffet table once they are released making for fun photos, videos, and memories while adding some flair to a normally mundane process. The DJ will efficiently blend between the songs at the appropriate time to release tables throughout the playlist. 

We have a sample playlists to release tables below to help inspire your own playlist

Trivia About the Newlyweds

[ps2id id=’newlywed-trivia’ target=”/]If you really want to test your family and friends on their knowledge about you two, a fun way to do that is through trivia questions. The goal is to share fun tid-bits about you two as a couple, and not make them compete for their spot in the buffet line.  To make this happen, the DJ can go in the order you originally planned and ask the tables a multiple choice trivia question, and if they get it right or wrong, they are still released. We found this downloadable template to help you release tables from Make it Mariko. 

Random Trivia Questions

[ps2id id=’random-trivia’ target=”/]Your wedding day is about you two and your love story, but if you want to mix it up a bit and instead test your guests’ knowledge on other trivia, you can test their pop-culture knowledge with movies, sports, music, etc. Feel free to mix it up and cover multiple genres. Just like the trivia about you two above, the same process can apply. 

Sing a Song to the Newlyweds

[ps2id id=’sing’ target=”/]Especially if you have a videographer, this is a fun way to engage your guests and have some great footage to add to your wedding video. The goal is to have 1 person or a group from the table come up to the newlyweds and sing a line or two from a song with the word “love” or any other word you want to use. Some guests have gone up to the DJ and asked to play the song to accompany them as they sing. There are many ways to do this and can be a lot of fun with the right crowd. 

Name That Tune! 

[ps2id id=’tune’ target=”/]Another fun game for music buffs is to have the DJ play 3-5 seconds of a song and the first table with the right answer earns the next spot at the buffet table. This can go pretty quickly and get some fun reactions all around. 

In summary, this is your wedding and you should include the things that you want and remove the things that you don’t want. If you want to have an engaging activity to help release the tables to the buffet, we hope the aforementioned options inspire you. If you want to keep things more simple, have the DJ or Wedding Planner discreetly release the tables to the buffet and use other times to find ways to engage your guests. 

Want to learn more? Schedule a no-strings-attached sit down with us before you tie the knot.

5 Fun Ways to Release Tables at Your Wedding