The Most Important Things to Ask Your Wedding Venue When Planning a Catskills Wedding
Catskills and Hudson Valley weddings are getting more and more popular as couples seek something different than the same old catering halls and cookie-cutter wedding venues. This is a unique region in which to host your wedding, and any bride or groom should definitely make sure to do their research. We’ve compiled this list of the most important questions to ask a wedding venue when planning a Catskills wedding.
What are the transportation options in the Catskills?
Long story short - if you’re planning a Catskills wedding, your guests are going to need a car. Many NYC couples don’t even think about this, then have to scramble to arrange transportation for their city-dwelling, car-free guests as their wedding draws nearer. The Catskills are only about 2 hours north of NYC, but there are few public transportation options to get here.
When advising our brides and grooms on transportation, the Beaverkill Valley Inn usually recommends a few different options.
If most of your guests have cars - fantastic! They can easily get to the Catskills from anywhere.
If guests are flying in - suggest that they rent a car. There is very limited public transportation in the region, and cabs can get expensive up here in the country.
If your guests are mostly from the NYC region and don’t have cars (as many city dwellers don’t!), we may recommend chartering a bus or similar. Catskill Carriage is a fantastic option to transport your guests from Brooklyn or Manhattan to our region.
Make sure that your venue offers enough parking, too. You don’t want your guests driving down a quaint country road to your ceremony and finding that there’s actually nowhere to park!
Does the venue offer catering?
Some venues may not actually have a kitchen on hand, which can quickly get extremely expensive for you. Caterers will have to set up a mobile kitchen or prepare the food in advance and warm it up on site. Another option would be to offer food trucks, which might not be feasible for larger events (and may result in long lines to eat, too!).
The Beaverkill Valley Inn has a world-class restaurant and kitchen on site, and we offer a customized farm-to-table menu for each of our private events. This makes our couple’s wedding planning a lot easier, since all of the catering is done in-house and on-site.
What’s the staff situation on the day of the event?
Sometimes couples will book a rustic barn or beautiful AirBNB farmhouse for their wedding, but these venues usually don’t have staff on hand. On the day of your event, you’ll want to make sure there’s staff to field deliveries and vendors, guide guests to parking and the ceremony site, and generally make sure the day is running as planned.
It’s important to ask your venue what the staffing situation will be at the time of your wedding. Will there be staff there leading up to the event to accept deliveries and tell the florists where to go? Will there be someone who can help answer questions for guests? Who does the cleanup when the event is over? Who’s going to make sure the ceremony starts on time? Wedding planners are a great person to do this, but at the Inn we also have full-time staff dedicated to making sure your event is going off without any issues even if you don’t have a seperate planner. Our hospitality manager Kathy helps coordinate and manage all of the day’s events. Our full-time bartenders and waitstaff have helped with countless weddings and galas at the Inn, giving them the experience to manage your event with ease.
What are your noise policies?
We may be in the country, but most venues have specific noise policies that are strictly enforced. If your party runs too loud for too long, you might be facing a fine from the local authorities - plus, the venue doesn’t want to make their neighbors angry with frequent loud parties. Some venues and townships require your party to end at a certain time, others request that the party be taken indoors after a certain hour (in other words, no loud music in the tent till 3 AM).
Ask your venue what their noise policy is, communicate it to your band or DJ, then plan your wedding schedule accordingly - don’t start the dancing 30 minutes before the noise restrictions start!
Is there lodging available at the venue or in the area? What are the room policies?
If you’re not from the area, a Catskills wedding will be kind of a mini destination wedding for most of your guests, and they’ll need a place to stay for at least a night or two. You’ll want to make sure that there are ample lodging opportunities at different price points a reasonable distance from your venue.
Ask your venue what their lodging options are. Do they require a certain number of rooms to be booked for a certain number of nights? If they don’t have enough lodging for your entire guest list, do they have recommendations for other hotels in the region?
At the Beaverkill Valley Inn, we have nineteen guest rooms and require the entire venue be booked for the wedding weekend. Most of our couples fill up this quota with their immediate family and wedding party. We recommend a number of trusted local inns, hotels, and rental companies for the remainder of your guests.
Ready to book your Catskills wedding? Get in touch with us here to schedule a tour.
