The Webtender
Forum and Chat

 Message 28265 of 39187 in General Discussion
 Share on Facebook |  Save to del.icio.us  
Subject: Re: How much should an open bar cost? -long
From: Spellbinder
Posted: Tue Jul 11. 2006, 07:58 UTC
Followup to: "Re: How much should an open bar cost? -long"  by mmmm  (Tue Jul 11. 2006, 06:57 UTC)
> Doing the math, it looks like the liqour cost was approximately $350 
> (in PA prices).  If the total bill was 93*75 (1627.50, plus the usual 
> 18% Gratuity [292] that goes into the gratuity pool that you and the 
> banquet servers receive 'wages' out of), you're looking at about 2000 
> for the total bill.  Liquor cost is 21.5%.  That actually looks 

Hmm, I hadn't considered that there may be additional gratuity tacked on, I 
considered in my own calculations (much more basic, and I left that unposted 
obviously) that gratuity wasn't included, but that cost of 
service/venue/consumables/taxes were included.  Really, gratuity shouldn't be 
a part of this calculation unless it actually is THE wage, and not real 
gratuity.

> Whatever I say, the bar made $1200 dollars with a pour cost of 23%, 
> not too shabby for 2.5 hours, especially on top of food, banquet 
> room, and hotel room fees for the hotel.  
> 
> Total Cost:  353.73 + taxes.

One thing, you left out food price...I wish I knew more about restaurant 
costing but my understanding has been that they run rougly 1:3 or 1:4 
depending on the perishability of the ingredients.  Let's assume 1:3 to be 
conservative.  And again for a wedding, at the very lowest, the menu price for 
the plates should be no less than $10, but let's assume $12 (because it makes 
the math easy)

$12 / 3 = $4 (ingredient cost)
$4 x 93 = $382

Food Labor is the other question.  This is a catered event, right?  Probably 
going to add up to around $150 (just thinking 15 man hours, probably between 
4-5 people, $10/hr).  Of course, if this is a restaurant that's already 
serving customers, this doesn't count as they can abuse the use of a kitchen 
staff and pay them little or nothing extra.

$382 + $150 = $532
$1200 - $532 = $668 (profit)

That's not TOO bad.  This is of course assuming a low food and kitchen labor 
cost.  Sorry, I forgot to look in the cost from your post to see if there was 
labor cost included.  Was the cost of renting the space covered in it?  When 
all is said and done, I doubt they did much better than break even.

-- 
Cody


 Current thread (23 messages):
 Message options:
 

Talk about drinks and bartending in The Webtender Forum.
Ask your questions, chat or share your best tricks with other visitors.

Home · Drink Recipes · Bookstore · Barstore · Handbook · Web Index · Feedback

Copyright © The Webtender.
About | Disclaimer | Privacy policy