5 Hidden Costs of Buying Event Furniture for Your Venue

By William Murphy - CEO of Event Stable

In the planning stages of opening up your new wedding venue? Congratulations!

You probably have a pretty big laundry list of projects underway, among them choosing a vendor and setting on what types of tables and chairs to buy. As long as you don’t buy ugly chairs, you’re off to a good start.

I often tell my colleagues and customers a little anecdote about venues and chairs. Back in 2012, when my then-fiance and I were planning our wedding and searching for a venue, I also owned my party rental company.

At Central Coast Tent & Party, we owned nice chiavari chairs, white padded folding chairs, the works. I planned to showcase them at my wedding (and write off half the expense of our photographer).

Still, when Heather and I visited venues, she got most excited about those that included tables and chairs in the site fee!

Moral of the story: a venue that owns nice tables and chairs is at an advantage over those that don’t.

That said, there are a few things owners don’t always consider when making the sizeable investment in event furniture. So, here are 5 costs to keep in mind as you look to stock up on tables and chairs.

1. Accessory Items

Once the fire marshall clears your venue for 200 people, your first thought is most likely going to be to get quotes for 200 chairs and 25 tables. That’s great, as you should certainly pad your bottom line by maxing out your capacity. However, don’t forget about the supporting cast when it comes to event equipment.

Be thinking about the types of events you plan to book. Will it be primarily weddings? Then, don’t forget about smaller tables to serve as cake tables or gift tables.

What about foodservice? Whether the caterers will be doing plated or buffet service, they are going to need banquet tables to plate and serve food.

For chairs, where will the DJ sit when he plays Etta James’ “At Last”? Don’t forget, the wedding vendors will need a place to sit and eat as well.

You may also consider keeping some pipe and drape on hand to shield guests from unsightly areas like food preparation, or storage. 

Source: Shutterstock

2. Freight and Delivery

Once you settle on a full list of tables, chairs and accessories, it’s time to add up the damage. As you get quotes for furniture from prospective vendors, they’ll most likely include a shipping estimate. Just make sure that you and your vendors have all the details.

The most beautiful wedding venues are often in far-off places - from a freight carrier’s perspective. They want to delivery to industrial areas, with loading docks. 

As a result, when they see that your lovely venue is located 15 miles from the freeway, down a dirt road, they add accessorial fees, such as “limited access” or “lift gate delivery”.

So, you’ll want to make sure that your freight quote includes these services, or they have the potential to be added later on. You’ll also want to find out if when the freight carrier imposes additional fees, who will be responsible to pay them.

3. Storage

Once you get all your tables and chairs delivered and out of boxes (and after you decide what to do with all that cardboard!), you need somewhere dry to store everything. In my experience, venues are often lacking in that department.

Fortunately, the bulk of your tables and chairs can be kept in the main reception area. They are, after all, going to spend most of the time there, being rearranged slightly for each event.

Do plan, though, on what to do if you book some “mid-week gold” in the form of a corporate seminar. You may be asked to move all those 60’’ rounds out, so have an idea about where you are going to keep them.

Beyond that, where will you store your ceremony chairs? Even folding chairs can take up quite a bit of space and you’ll need space to get around when moving the stacks.

If you don’t have a large closet or dedicated storage area within the venue, you’ll have to be get creative and go outside. Some build storage sheds specifically for their chairs.

I’ve seen other venues buy enclosed trailers for the job, which serve double duty if you have a hike to get to the ceremony site.

Source: Author’s photo

4. Staff

When I started in the rental business, I was a one-man show. It wasn’t long though before I recruited my reluctant little brother to lend some muscle. Still, not much longer after that, I realized my time was best served on other tasks.

You aren’t going to want to be the one schlepping tables and chairs in and out of storage for long. You’re going to need some good, reliable part-time help.

It’s well known by business owners that one of the biggest expense items on their P&L is staff. It’s up to you how to keep these costs to a minimum due to how infrequently you may need additional labor on site.

Be thinking about all the times throughout the event season that chairs will need to be moved, and someone will need to be on site for any rental deliveries, catering pickups, and so on. Friday evening events need to be broken down and rooms reset for Saturday morning weddings.

And although there may not be a full day’s worth of work for employees, you may have to pay for minimum hours worked depending on your state. Be sure to contact your local labor board for more information.

5. Cleaning and Maintenance

This one ties in closely with staff, but I felt it was worth detailing on its own. When I started my rental business, I was well aware of the costs of bringing on additional personnel. Keeping my equipment clean and working, well that was another story.

In an effort to be a little different, and because I had a market for them, the first chairs I added to my rental inventory were chiavari chairs. I quickly learned that while those chairs paid for themselves quickly, they took up a lot of space (in the delivery truck) and were more work to keep clean.

After every event, it seemed like 25% of the cushions had wine stains on them. There would also be a handful with footprints (Uncle Mitch looking for that great camera phone shot?).

To get the chairs ready for the following week, I’d have to remove the foam from the cushions to launder them. This was a lot of work. I quickly upgraded my cushions from the soft foam to the hard pads with slipcovers.

Other chairs need love too. Folding chairs get muddy feet, and guest’s muddy feet leave marks on the back of chairs. They all need to get wiped down to keep the overall venue experience top-notch. 

Bottom Line

Don’t let any of this deter you from investing in your venue with tables and chairs to make it as attractive as possible to your clients. You already made a great decision to own your equipment.

It just helps to be as prepared as possible so you can turn that venue into a 50-wedding-a-year, money-making machine.

William Murphy is the president of EventStable.com, an online supplier of tables, chairs and event equipment for venues and rental companies. After starting and selling Central Coast Tent & Party, he now spends his weekends running and wrangling his young daughters.