Special Wedding Column
November 13, 2011 Deadline
Special Issue
There’s More than One App for Weddings, Too
Brides and grooms, as you plan your special day you might find it reassuring that for everything from the guest list to the reception music the slogan is true: “There’s an app for that!”
App developers know you need some assistance. More than three dozen iPhone and iPad apps match the keyword “wedding” when searching the Apple iTunes App Store. There are a dozen or so wedding applications in the Android Marketplace, as well.
With so many wedding apps in the App Store and Android Marketplace, you should read the reviews carefully. Only a handful of apps receive four or five stars in the user reviews. Thankfully, apps are affordable so you can try several different wedding-themed apps and still spend less than $25.
An iTunes gift card would allow a bride-to-be to purchase a complete set of wedding apps, including a game or two.
Wedding Planners
The most popular wedding apps help organize your planning. From the top-rated iWedding Deluxe to a handful of free applications sponsored by bridal magazines, there’s no shortage of apps to keep you on schedule.
A popular free app is The Knot’s Ultimate Wedding Planner. It is a nice app, but its real purpose is to support advertisers. The “helpful suggestions” featured in the application are paid advertisements.
I recommend iWedding. It is not free, but iWedding is a great value at $6.99. The app maintains your guest list, suggests a seating chart, can help order decorations, and will even download the ideal music to match your ceremony. The countdown feature sounds alarms each day to remind you of upcoming tasks.
The home screen of iWedding is split in half. The top portion resembles a formal wedding invitation with the names of the bride and groom. Under the wedding date is a running counter showing how many months, days, hours, minutes and seconds remain until the big day. The second half of the screen is a checklist of the tasks to be completed.
The first task is to create the various guest lists. iWedding uses your phone or tablet address book application to let you easily add guests. There are guest lists for the bridal shower, wedding, reception, and any event you want to add. The seating chart focuses on the reception. You can arrange the names by table in any mix of friends and family you desire.
Shopping Guides
Most of the wedding apps are shopping guides. There are shopping apps for rings, dresses, flowers, cakes, and photographers. The apps are often free because various companies and organizations sponsor them. For example, the engagement ring apps tend to promote national chains whereas if you want something special you’ll want to work with an independent, locally-owned jeweler.
iWedding takes a different approach, using Web search engines to help you locate shops. The iWedding app does include “inspiration” images of dresses, rings, and cakes. However, the application allows you to select the shops you prefer and add them to the contact address book. This flexibility is why I believe it is best to buy a great app instead of using a free tool.
Reception Virtual D.J.
For 99 cents you can download a number of “virtual D.J.” applications for the reception. The “Fun Wedding” application, for example, maintains a list of the top-rated music for receptions based on a national survey of professional D.J. playlists. The playlists are updated monthly. If you want favorite wedding songs of the 1980s, Fun Wedding will automatically download the music from iTunes. Within any playlist, you can refine the search using headings such as “First Dance” and “Father of the Bride.”
If you want to use iTunes or an iPod as your music player, you do have to pay normal iTunes fees for any music purchased. I suggest hiring a local D.J. and using an app like Fun Wedding to help create a playlist. With Fun Wedding, you can email your playlist to anyone, including your D.J. Professional audio systems now include iPad and iPod support.
Fun and Games
To take a break from the planning stress, you might want to download one of the many wedding-themed games. For example, you can play iBride and create the perfect fantasy wedding for a virtual bride. With “WeeMee Wedding” you can create a virtual couple inspired by the “Precious Moments” figurines.
You can also try the “Weakest Link: Royal Weddings” game. How much do you know about Kate and William? There are also several celebrity wedding trivia games. The major entertainment and gossip magazines sponsor these trivia apps.
The top-selling “Wedding Dash” lets you guide a caterer through the challenges of preparing and serving at a large reception. Your caterer even has to deal with a wedding crasher who is at the wedding for the free food. The “Dinner Dash” series is second in sales to “Angry Birds” on the App Store.
There are also apps like “Bachelorette Diva,” a trivia game that tests the bridesmaids’ knowledge of the happy couple. The questions range from the innocent (“How did the couple meet?”) to the not-so-innocent. How much do your bridesmaids know?
Yes, there is an app for that…