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Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought the only rule about leaving was that no guests should leave before the cake cutting. Most weddings I've been to haven't even have a "grand exit"...I'm not sure people will be waiting for it.
I really think it depends on your cultural background. I know that in my culture, there isn't even such a thing as a "grand exit". The bride and groom and their parents are the hosts of the party and therefore should be the last to leave after bidding their guests good-bye - that's the way I was brought up and that's the way all the weddings i've been to have progressed. I do know that in the US it's customary for the B&G to have a grand exit and, unless there will be many little ones, I don't see why your guests would need to leave before 10:45. I think you're okay(but then I also wouldn't be offended if people left early).
swiveling_silverplated_cake_server.jpg (19.2 KB, 27 downloads) 1 year old 
I think it all depends on the family as well as your cultural background as well. I personally do not think it is rude to leave prior to the B & G's grand exit if there even is one. There were no grand exits for the weddings I have attended.
What I did think was rude or strange was at my BF wedding, 80% of her guests left around 10:30 PM and the wedding was scheduled until 11:30 PM. The bride was a little disappointed but it didn't ruin the day because then she got to spend more time with the remaining guests.
I don't think it's rude. I've been to several weddings where I left before the bride & groom - i had to. For one, I was moving across the country the very next day. I literally had to go home and pack up the dress I was wearing. lol. Another, I had traveled 3 hours by car to be there, and needed to drive home that same evening. And for Mrs. and Mr. Cherry Pie's wedding, I left at like 10 pm. Mr. MJ and I, and one of the groomsmen who didn't feel well (along with his FI), were the only people who left on that first school-bus shuttle. I felt bad but we did have to drive 22 hours home the next day, so we really needed to turn in.
In any circumstance where I need to leave early, I let the bride and groom know before the wedding day and give them an honest and reasonable reason why I won't be staying. They've always been understanding.
Is it just me that noticed you are cutting the cake before dinner or the first dance? I am thinking that might be a typo; I have never seen that order before. Oh, I don't think it is too late for you to leave then!
I don't think it's rude either. I'm no expert - never been to a wedding with a grand exit - but it seems a little silly to me that it'd be considered rude for a guest to leave.
Sorry that didn't make sense - I don't think it is rude for guests to leave before your grand exit. We are not having an exit, but really, guests should be allowed to leave when they choose. 
@flbeachbride - one of my friends did it in that order; they figured it'd be best to do it while everyone was first sat down, enjoying their cocktails -- before the mingling and partying began.
Hmm.
My FI said he asked around and that his office said that it's a general rule that people wait for us to leave. I'm confused, we are not asking our guests to be around all day long! It's not like our wedding's at 2pm or something. The ceremony/reception is literally at the same place. He said we should be prepared to leave anywhere from 10-1045. I am NOT leaving at 10pm. That's ABSURD. Even if his family leaves (old people, go figure) my friends will still be there and i plan on dancing and having fun. I think leaving a reception at 10pm when teh ceremony STARTS at 6pm is cutting it awfully short.
We're not paying all this money to a) be shortchanged on our reception time and b) feel like we have to leave early.
Even if all the guests leave early and all that's left is my bridal party and family, i still want to stay and dance party it up 
For a guy who gets offended when I tell him his family lacks etiquette (if you've seen my other posts) and that i'm a stickler for stuff, he's pushing this kind of hard. He can wait one more hour in my opinion.
Good to know i'm not being the one lacking in proper etiquette though, seeing as how i'm a stickler and all.
Well, I'm not sure when to cut the cake. At one wedding, the cake was cut as soon as the couple came in. It gave the reception hall time to cut it all up. It was served immediatley after dinner.
At another wedding, it was cut later and served halfway through the reception. We're having an open bar. I don't want it ignored because peopel are drunk. Maybe drunk cake-eating is better though. haha. So, yeah, I also thought about doing it sometime later.....i don't know.
That's just a generic timeline for now. I just haven't set it in stone yet. I guess I'll need to look around a little more.
Thanks Miss Maryjane! It's is interesting how different cultures/regions have so many different customs, like my FI's family had never heard of doign a toast or prayer before dinner, and I have never been to a wedding that didn't have a prayer before dinner. It is extremely interesting to see all of these in practice. Does the whole cake get cut then though, or is the rest saved until later? I would think it would wait since the cake slices may not be as moist as when they are freshly cut; however, I have never refused cake before dinner.
I've never heard of it being rude to leave before a grand exit, only before cake cutting....But, I've never been to a wedding where they did a grand exit.
Uh oh - by most standards FI and I are rude. I've only been to a couple weddings but we've always (except for FI's sisters wedding but that's different) left before the grand exit. I don't think it's rude at all, if someone has to leave for whatever reason they shouldn't feel bad for leaving. Just my opinion though. :)
I'm with several other posters, I thought it was rude to leave only before the cake cutting. What if you have older relatives who can't or don't want to stay all night, or people with younger children?
I think you're fine on the etiquette in this case. Good luck!
Now he said that one of his buddies had a 7pm-10pm reception and it was the *perfect* amount of time.
Wow. And I thought our reception would be short! It's my guests perogative to leave early.
Most of them are old but i'm not compromising MY fun for THEIRS. I'm just not that considerate I guess =]. But then again, we have plenty of younger friends there, too. So why SHOULDN'T we stick around and stuff?!
I will win this. You watch, LoL.
can you just skip the "grand exit"? I haven't ever seen one myself, but maybe that ia regional thing....as a guest, when the music stops, I would think the wedding is over and just leave - how will people know they should stick around to watch your exit?
Plenty of people left before my "grand exit"---that was the part where the DJ said "last song" and we got into the limo and they threw rose petals on us. I was not in the least offended. Everyone did stay until the cake cutting though (which was after dinner). I wouldn't worry about this and just stay as long as you want.
I would even think to wait until the grand exit, unless you make it clear to people that they are expected for a grand exit, people will leave when they choose. I would be put out if the bride and groom expected me to stay until they felt like leaving.
I think you should do your grand exit when you choose to, and guest will leave when they choose to.
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I've never even seen a grand exit. I am not sure most guest would be aware of one unless explicity explained to them. I say let people leave when they are ready to, but in general I think your reception is about the right length of time.
I dont' think we need a grand exit, personally. The location doesn't let us have sparklers or anything cool anyways
And my parents are taking us to our hotel because we're poor and don't want to pay a limo all that money to take us so far away. The hotels near our venue are GHETTO so we're driving back towards where my house is, 40 min.
He keeps saying he googled all these sites that said we HAD to leave first. Funny, I didn't find any of these sites, and apparently none of you have heard of this either!
It's not rude to leave before the grand exit, but you could always put something on the ceremony cards asking guests to stay for the grand exit. Of course worded a lot cooler and elegantly then please stay till the end. Some older people don't want to party till 11 no matter where they are. Majority will stay till the end but not all of them will. There is nothing wrong with your reception time or timeline.
fl-1-j-crew-gracie-size-0.jpg (11 KB, 48 downloads) 1 year old 
I don't think it's rude for people to leave after the "grand exit". Actually, I've never been to a wedding that had one of those. We're planning on staying until the end of the reception and hanging with our friends. I figure we paid for and planned the party, we should be able to stick around and enjoy it til the end!! We did want to do our dance and the cake cutting earlier in the night, in case any of the older guests wanted to leave.
Well sadly as a "transient wedding guest" that I've been (usually only on an on-call weekend when I'd get called in to the hospital for an emergency), the people know WHY I'd ever leave first of all early. Once I had to leave (was a very long wedding and reception)two times!
I think that we know our guests..most will wish to stay and want to. But if they have any of these issues, I'd let them easily off the hook: fussy child, or baby with babysitter (so no screaming at YOUR wedding), emergency with work (like me), or unforseen emergency (sick relative or something) that it's fine. Now eating and bolting just because you could care less? Well I don't plan on even inviting anybody who'd eat and bolt at our wedding because they would WANT to be there and involved in the first place.
Imho, in the past when I've seen the "eat and runs", they were so-so friends or merely acquaintences of the BnG or not so close relatives.
Our reception goes til 1am so I most certainly won't be upset if people leave before we do- we're staying til the very end!! I guess I'd be upset if friends left early for no reason, but if they have a reason, I understand. It's easy to forget that other people have lives when its "our big day" but really- they do.
I actually have a wedding in a few weeks and I'm leaving it early. I would never do thatnormally but it is a special circumstance for me. It's my college reunion and all my friends are in town for one night, some I haven't seen in years, another was recently in a horrible ATV accident and was left paralyzed and is even going to be there. I was superbly bummed when I realized the wedding was the same day, so my fiance suggested I just sneak out around 10:30 or 11 and not worry about it. I'll say something to the bride to explain but really, I will be there most of the night anyway, I don't think they will miss me that much. My FI will be staying. Do people think that's really rude??
We didn't have a grand exit but everyone came to talk to us before they left. My in-laws left before a lot of other guests did, which I thought was strange.
It's definitely not the final exit but the cake cutting. Think about it--the exit is essentially signaling that the party is over--last song, bird seed, etc. And then you're supposed to hide or not continue the party with the rest of your guests? That just seems silly!
Now, maybe you could move it back to 10:30--that would give you 15 minutes to gather people together for the send off, and 15 minutes for people to gather their things, say goodbye, etc.
I agree, not only in not having seen a grand exit before (is that just in the wedding shows?) but also in not being offended if guests left early. Really there are bundles of reasons why people might leave early. And it might not be something they can tell you ahead oftime in the receiving line. What if they get a little tipsy? What if the music gives them a headache? What if their shoes really start killing their feet? Or they're exhausted?
I've been to weddings in which many guests left early. While it might be disappointing to a bride and groom, I've noticed reasons. Either the guests were mostly older and tuckered out early, or (well) the music was not likeable. It's hard to stick around too long if you don't like the music at all, and it's so loud you can't talk to the person next to you.
But ultimately, I think you can't really hold guests hostage until a bride and groom decide to leave. But ejs, I think you should stay until you want to leave. It sounds like you are stuck between wanting to enjoy every minute of your reception and wanting to do an exit. It might be a choice between the two. (I stayed to the end of of my recpetion, without a grand exit, and have no regets.)
Oh, I don't really care about the exit. I just thought it was the *norm* and we had to do one! So I don't think we will. We can't have cool sparklers anyways.
I want to stay and have fun with my FI and friends and close family. Anyone who leaves early is likely old, has something to do, a child, or doesn't know us THAT well. I know my girls will be drinking and having fun and I don't want to look back and say that my wedding was all work and no play!
But seriously, where my FI got the impression it was RUDE of US to stick around until the end of the reception is beyond me! Especially since it ends at 11pm, wow. Thx for the insight. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't in the wrong if i was going to state my case to him so much in my favor
I am going to have to also say that maybe this is like a different part of the country/world thing? I have never ever been to a wedding where the bride and groom had a grand exit. Granted I have mostly only been to ones on the east coast and a couple in Europe, but I have never seen it. Personally, I plan on leaving last because I want the party to last as long as possible and not miss a minute of my wedding! Its going to go by fast enough without cutting off a half hour of it!
I've never stayed at a wedding for the 'grand exit.'
wed13.JPG (420.6 KB, 28 downloads) 1 year old You must log in to post.
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Beekeeper
Is it rude for people to leave before the bride and groom?
Here's our timeline. My FI thinks we should do our exit earlier....but my parents are dropping us off at our hotel. I don't want to just go outside and hang out, hiding! What do you think?
6pm Ceremony
630-7 apps/cocktails
7 guests go inside for dinner
715 cake cutting, arrival of wedding party
730 dinner served
8-815 toasts
815-830 first dances
830-1030 dancing
1030 last song
1045 grand exit
11 everyone leaves
My Fi said: "Looks good, but i think we have to make our grand exit earlier than that, even if it means we just have to hang out and hide. people are considered rude if they leave before the bride and groom and it's ignorant of us to keep them there that late in my opinion. It all depends on timing and how it works out. If at any point after dancing people get restless, we should leave"
Frankly, our ceremony is at 6pm. People are ONLY going to be at this place from 530-11pm, with only 2.5 hours of dancing. I don't think it's rude of us to stay til 1045! Am I misinformed about etiquette? Or is my FI too old fashioned?