Whether you’re seating 10 or 100, it’s important to know who is seated where and what’s important to them. Seating charts are the tool for the job. In some cases, your team will do seating arrangements in advance, taking direction from the host about positioning in the room and at the table. For less formal gatherings, your Butler Service Captain should make note of where everyone is seated at the table and fill out the seating chart before service begins.
There are a number of reasons to use seating charts at every event, large or small. These charts keep a record of table mates for future seating arrangements; the host may wish to switch things up next time to keep conversation fresh. You may be asked for the name of a guest’s table mate and want to be able to provide that information. Most importantly, seating charts are an essential part of your pre-service meeting. Servers may need to know which guests have allergies, dietary restrictions or requests, or specific customs that need to be recognized. The kitchen will need to know this too, in order to time delivery of service to guests with special requests.
We’ve created Canva templates for several typical layouts, and it’s easy to cut and paste the elements to create your own. In this template pack you’ll find both type-in templates and write-in templates. They’re easy to fill and print. I keep several write-in copies of our main dining room set ups printed in a file for last-minute gatherings. We’ve also included a guest list with requests chart and a seating sign that could be enlarged to print for guests.
New to Canva? You’ll thank us for getting you to sign up. It’s an easy-to-use graphic design tool with thousands of templates to get you started. We’ll be creating several Canva templates in the future.
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