Before you even start planning your ceremony you will need to think about who is going to make up your wedding party. The bride will choose her maid of honour and bridesmaids and the groom must fist choose his best man, who will then in turn help him find his ushers! The people that you choose have as your ushers need to be as reliable as possible as they will be ensuring that your wedding guests are seated in the ceremony venue and they will be ensuring that everyone arrives at the reception venue. The ushers are more often than not brothers or close relatives or friends of the bride or groom. It is suggested that you have at least one usher for each 50 guests, so if you are only having a small wedding of 50 guests then you only need one usher! As the best man is the head of the groomsmen, it is his job to ensure that all the ushers know their duties well in advance of the wedding.
The bride and groom have just asked you to be an usher at their wedding, of course you have accepted! But what are your duties? What will you need to do as an usher? Below is a list of the main usher duties you will have to perform. Usually everything starts coming together about four months before the wedding is due to happen as weddings are usually planned over 6-12 months, however this list will need to be revised slightly depending on the planning time allocated for the wedding:
About 4 months before the wedding day:
- Arrange the purchase or hire of the wedding suits and agree who will be paying for them. The suits for all the groomsmen will be usually sorted out together along with the suit of the groom.
Here is a little TIP! Try not to lose or gain weight between your suit fittings, it makes it hard work for the tailors!
The week before the wedding:
- Ensure all the travel arrangements to the ceremony venue and reception venue have been confirmed with the other ushers and the best man. You need to make sure you are NOT late.
- The best man will have a copy of the family and friends who will need to be escorted to their seats, you will need to ensure you have this list as well as you, the usher, will be the one escorted these people to their seats.
- If the couple is having a wedding rehersal then you will need to attend the wedding rehearsal if it is required of you.
- Have your hair cut, you want to look as smart as possible for the big day.
- Obtain large umbrellas, you never know what the weather is going to be like on the big day!
The day before the big day!:
- Collect any hired clothing and accessories. Ensure that you check through everything thoroughly to make sure that nothing is missing. If you do not have your tie on the day of the wedding it is highly unlikely you'll be able to make a quick trip to the shops to buy a new tie, especially if the wedding is on a Sunday!
On the day of the wedding itself:
- Collect the buttonholes and order of service sheets from the bride. This can be done the day before if everything is ready, be sure to ask the bride when she would like you to collect this information.
- You will need to arrive at the church about 20 minutes to half an hour before guests are due to arrive to ensure that you are aware of any slight problems. Some guests like to arrive very early, you will need to be there to greet those guests as well!
At the church/ceremony venue:
- Help with car parking. It would be quite a good idea to check out the parking situation before hand so you know how much parking is available at the venue. Also find alternative parking areas in case the allocated parking at the venue becomes full, there is often not enough parking at the venue.
- When the guests arrive make sure you greet them with a smile, then hand out the buttonholes, order of service sheets and maps showing the route to the reception.
- Ensure the officiant of the ceremony has order of service sheets for the bride and groom, they will not be carrying their own but will need to know what is happening throughout the ceremony.
- Seat couples with young babies and children near the exit, if babies start to cry some guests will want to make a speedy exit, this wont be possible if they are near the front of the venue. They will feel embarassed at disrupting the wedding.
- Escort the brides mother and appropriate guests to their seats. You will have been briefed on this by the best man.
- Assist the photographer with anything that they require. It is their job to capture the special moments of the big day for the bride and groom.
- Ensure the church is left tidy and check for any left property and unused order of service sheets.
- Ensure all guests have transport to the reception.
At the reception:
- Assist with car parking facilities.
- Offer drinks to the guests as they arrive if appropriate.
- Assist any elderly or infirm guests.
- Be on of the first on the dancefloor! If the groomsmen and bridesmaids aren't dancing, then why should the other guests?
Once the wedding is over:
- Return any hired clothing and accessories, the date for this will have been agreed with the tailors. Make sure you are not late returning the clothing as this could incur an extra charge.
From the list above you can see that the ushers have a lot of responsibility both before the wedding and during. You are reliant on them and the best man to ensure that everything goes smoothly before the groom and bride arrive. It is important therefore as the bride and groom to take this into account and ensure that you ushers are properly thanked. The perfect way to do this is quite simply to say thank you to them, those two words go a long way, the best way to say thank you to them is first in person to their face, but it is usually done in the wedding speech. Secondly, say thank you by giving
Usher Gifts. The ushers have accepted the honour of being part of your wedding, but not only this they will have had to give up time out of their own lives to go to suit fittings, the wedding rehersal and more. It is important to show your appreciation for this. Below is a list of some of our favourite
Usher Gifts:
1)
Engraved Wedding Cufflinks: These are a great gift, they are simple yet very sentimental. If your ushers wear suits on a regular basis then the cufflinks that you give could be worn quite regularly, so good use will be made of them. You could also give the ushers a special set of cufflinks that you would like them to wear on the wedding day, the cufflinks could be engraved with a special thank you message or with the initials of the ushers.
2) Personalised Whisky or Engraved Whisky: Depending on your budget you could give a bottle of tipple to the ushers, each with an individual message to thanks from the bride and groom. If your ushers are not a fan of whisky then there is the choice of other
personalised bottle gifts, like for example personalised wine/engraved wine or personalised champagne/engraved champagne. If you hadn't guessed we are suggesting a personalised bottle gift of some sort!
3)
Engraved Pens: We all write and therefore we all use pens, engraved pens are therefore a great sentimental gift that will be used on a regular basis., so why not give an engraved pen set with a special thank you message.
If you aren't partial to the gifts that we have listed above then not to worry, just visit our
Usher Gifts page and you'll hopefully find what you are looking for. We also have access to 30,000 gifts, give us a call on 01775 640788 and we'll try our best to help you find the gift that you are looking for.
Date posted: 15/09/2011
