Two weeks before a wedding, we prepare a run sheet. One page, printed, formatted in twelve-point type so that it is readable in a moving vehicle in low light. Every movement, every pickup time, every drop-off address, and any larger vehicle arranged for guests.
We do not deliver it digitally. We print it.
Why paper
A phone can lock. A phone can lose battery. A phone can receive a message at the wrong moment that takes the chauffeur’s attention away from the page they were reading.
A printed run sheet cannot do any of these things. It sits on the passenger seat. The chauffeur can see it at a glance. If the phone dies, if the GPS routes incorrectly, if someone is unreachable at eleven forty-five at night, the page is still there.
This is not a technology position. We use GPS. We use messaging. We use every tool available to us. But the paper is the floor. The floor is always there.
What revisions teach us
We deliver the first draft two weeks out. We receive corrections. The corrections are rarely about timing — the timing we have usually got right. The corrections are about details we did not know: the bride’s mother uses a walking frame and needs the van positioned closer to the door; the venue has a new one-way system that came into effect last month; the groom’s family are flying in from interstate and the flight has been moved.
Each correction improves the sheet. By the day of the wedding, the page has usually been through three revisions. The third revision is always the most accurate, and it is always produced because someone who knew something told us.
We ask. We revise. We print.