Hotel Blocks

What we did was gave folks the option if they wanted to stay in a hotel/which hotel they wanted to stay in (depending on pricing) - we scouted about 3 hotels in our area (DC - we had about 50 couples/families traveling into town), and reached out for pricing/terms for about 20 rooms for each hotel. We went with hotels that offered a special rate for guests up until a certain date, and hotels that did not inflict a penalty fee if the room block was not 90% booked - we were surprised that a lot of hotels did this (read the fine print!) - if the room block was not at the agreed upon capacity, we would have to make up the cost. If you start to shop around, the hotels will be able to guide you through the process no problem - good luck!

I would suggest setting up a courtesy block at 1-2 different hotels in the area, and block it out for the entire weekend. This just means they guarantee that the number of rooms you block off will be available for the whole weekend if you need them (up until the room block reservation deadline, which is usually 4-6 weeks before check in - at that time, any unused rooms/nights will be returned to the hotel to sell to someone else for that weekend). When guests call to reserve a room in the block, they can choose the dates that they want to stay in that window, whether it's one night or the whole weekend. The guests will book and pay for their own rooms, and you wouldn't be responsible for the costs of any unused rooms. Often times, a room block gets a cheaper rate.

View Quoted Comment Emily brought up a good point - not all hotels do courtesy blocks. Always read the fine print before you sign. Many hotels will do a courtesy block. I suggest finding one that will, just so you're not responsible for the cost of any unbooked rooms, and you wouldn't need to pay a deposit to hold the rooms. I wouldn't suggest booking a room block that charges a penalty if the capacity isn't met (unless you know for sure that you'll meet the capacity).

I would look at hotels in the area of your venue, scope out which ones you like, and then reach out to them to ask how their room block policy works. All of them are a little different, but if you have people traveling, it's a nice thing to offer.

We have a block contract with just one hotel, but if we had more out-of-town guests (or more options nearby), we would have considered two.

With ours, the discounted rate is available for two nights (the Friday before, and the Saturday of), and there's no penalty if the rooms don't get filled. They also get filled in blocks of 10 -- so if 10 rooms get booked, they'll open up another set of 10. The deadline to reserve a room is September 10th (a month out), and at that time any unfilled rooms go up for general sale to the public.

I believe if the first block of 10 gets filled, we get a complimentary upgrade to a "romance package." It's nothing fancy, just some strawberries and champagne, but it's a nice little bonus.

Here's a detailed article that may help
https://www.venuereport.com/roundups/13-tips-for-booking-hotel-room-blocks-for-your-wedding/entry/6/

Here's an insider tip: contact the local CVB and tell them that you're hosting a wedding with out of town guests and need assistance with setting up a courtsey room block. This only works in cities that have a visitor's bureau. Some suburbs have these, too, so it's not limited to just the major cities. (E.g., Naperville and Schaumburg probably have them, but Crystal Lake might not.)


I contacted the CVB in the city I was getting married in, and they did all the work! They provided me with a document with all of the quoted rates and any bonuses the hotels offered like free parking, breakfast, bridal suite, etc. When the pandrmic hit, they reached out and offered to help move my room block to a new date. They are also planning to provide me with items I can give to my guests, such as discount cards to museums and a local map.

They do all of this for free! Their job is to bring in tourists and business to the city, so they not only assist with large conventions, but with weddings and family reunions. If it's available where you're getting married, use this valuable, time saving resource.

Reach out to a couple of hotels and ask for pricing for your wedding dates. I would NOT sign a contract for a block as you will be liable for that block if not met.

If you're expecting 30 rooms I'd request a courtesy hold up to a month prior at a specialty rate, and ask for 1/2 the amount of rooms (room nights) if you think your guests may opt to stay with family.

Get the booking link and then share that information with wedding details and on your website. I requested a very small block of rooms for our guests knowing our guests may want options and the only ones that would stay with us at the resort were the ones who had no financial obligations. (Weirdly 85% of our guests all booked at our resort... LOL) - But we're still under no financial obligation if we didn't meet the block.

View Quoted Comment This is an excellent idea

We will be doing a courtesy block at a hotel for our out of town guests.

We're doing a courtesy block at a hotel near the venue. While many of our guests do live in state, our wedding ends pretty late so we wanted to give people an option to book a room nearby to prevent them from driving tired. What our agreement is we put aside a set number of rooms based on who we think will stay in a hotel & guests can use a link or use our names to book at the special rate. If we don't use up all of the rooms, we don't be financially responsible (which was a plus for us) and those rooms will go back into the general pool for people to book at regular price. This can be an option for you since you don't want to be responsible if all the rooms aren't used.

There are onlineservices that will figure this out for you, for free. We used Kleinfeld hotel blocks to set one up for us. We got a courtesy block of 30 rooms. It was really easy and ours came with a free room for us and upgraded rooms for the parents of a certain number of rooms were booked.

I would get prices from a couple different ones and definitely ask who or if anyone will be interested in booking a room. I would start with a courtesy block

Call and ask. You should reasonably be able to find a hotel that doesn't lock you to guaranteed number of rooms, i.e. puts you on the $ hook.

We had two complimentary blocks, one through Marriott and one through Wyndham. It didn't cost us anything. Most our guests stayed at our main Marriott block.