Home Party Planning: Get the Max for the Minimum…

Home Party Planning: Get the Max for the Minimum…

January 27th, 2010 @ 2:02 pm by Mrs. Nachos
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… minimum price! T-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-J-Maxx! Sorry, I had to.

Anywho, if you remember, our home party is going to cost us a minimum of $5,000. This price includes a drink package and appetizers for each guest. We had a few options regarding what kind of drinks and food we could get, so I made yet another spreadsheet to break it all down and figure out exactly how many people we could have to be right at the $5,000 mark…

Home Party Planning: Get the Max for the Minimum… : wedding budget 17 1

Yeah, I’m a nerd. And I made a HUGE mistake.

I factored tax and gratuity into the $5,000. Yeah, about that… those don’t get calculated until AFTER we reach the $5,000. The good news: we can invite more people! The bad news: our $5,000 party just turned into a $6,500 party. Such is life. I am NOT looking for another venue over $1,500. So I went back and recalculated the right way after we decided that we wanted to do drinks with appetizers as opposed to entrees, pizza, or sandwiches…

Home Party Planning: Get the Max for the Minimum… : wedding budget 22 2

We agreed on the Well Drinks Package and Apps. package for 3 hours. So now we know that we can have 107 people there and be at our minimum. If we have less than that show up, we still have to pay the full $5,000 so we’re planning on overshooting our 107 person goal by a little knowing that some people will not be able to make it. If we happen to go over, then we have to pay the package price per person for every person over 107. Does that make sense? It’s a relief having a number to shoot for, because now we can finalize our guest list and figure out how many invitations to order.

How did you come up with the number of people you wanted to invite to your wedding?

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19 Responses to “Home Party Planning: Get the Max for the Minimum…”

Member

Ms. Library (message) 1,250 posts, Bumble bee

My venue requires at least 80 people. The per plate price was fixed, so it was really all about how much we were willing to spend. We wanted to have our nearest and dearest there, but not go overboard because of price. We ended up with about 110 people.

1/27/10 @ 2:11 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Pug (message) 3,753 posts, Honey bee

ooh, i like your spreadsheet. we counted up the people we wanted to invite, which for us grumpy antisocial people, turned out to be about 60, so we looked for venues that specifically fit that number. my main limit to expanding the guest list is the room capacity and mr. pug yelling at me “whhyyyy???”

1/27/10 @ 2:24 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Spaniel (message) 6,792 posts, Bee Keeper

Nice! We came up with our number based on budget… and then our families added 50 people between them. Oh well!

1/27/10 @ 2:25 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Guinea Pig (message) 1,377 posts, Bumble bee

Yeah I hate that the tax + gratuity is not included in the minimum! We have a minimum $/person and a minimum number of people (so I guess that works out to a minimum total cost), but if we don’t hit the minimum people we can always just get more expensive stuff for the people who are there! We’ve settled on a number we’re happy with too (ie, the bare minimum, ha) and we’ll just get whatever combo gives us that.

1/27/10 @ 2:26 pm (reply)

Member

honeydew (message) 68 posts, Worker bee

Miss Nachos- Just so that you are budgeting correctly….

I’m also in Chicago too and wanted you to be aware that tax for food and beverages are 11.5%. http://www.illinoisrestaurants.org/

Vines is an awesome place!

1/27/10 @ 2:27 pm (reply)

Bee

Miss Nachos (message) 1,733 posts, Bumble bee

@honeydew: We’re actually locked in at 10.25% through the restaurant contract, so we’re all good. It’s still ridiculous though!

1/27/10 @ 2:43 pm (reply)

Member

Violachap (message) 677 posts, Busy bee

Great planning though! I’ll definitely be using spreadsheets to figure out our catering mix!

1/27/10 @ 2:47 pm (reply)

Member

hungrybruno (message) 28 posts, Newbee

Ha, Miss Spaniel - my parents did the SAME thing. I’m trying to just roll with it. And also trying to figure out how to feed an extra 40 cousins I haven’t seen in 10 years!

1/27/10 @ 3:12 pm (reply)

Guest

Megan

I know hotels and most venues in Chicago are 11.5 so you’re super lucky to be locked in at 10.25. My venue like many other Chicago ones automatically adds 22% gratuity too. Also if anyone is just starting their search downtown and sees this: make sure to ask about Union fees! I know the Drake and PH Hilton have these along with some others so Chicago brides make sure you check before you sign anything! All of these fees will add thousands to your budget. We definitely have a crazy spreadsheet figuring it all out too.

1/27/10 @ 3:37 pm (reply)

10.