Hosted bar costing more?

WildMagelet

Sooooo the caterer we're looking at lists drink prices for both cash and hosted bars.  

At first glance you'd think that hosted prices are cheaper (by about $.50/drink), but the fine print at the bottom says that hosted pricing will also have tax and a 20% service charge added on, which makes the hosted drinks actually $.40-$.85 more than cash pricing per drink.

Is that normal?  

I emailed them back for clarification.  It just seems backwards to me for a hosted consumption bar to cost more.

Maggie0829

Well the 20% service charge could be gratuity, but double check that.  And tax is just expected.  For a cash bar they would still need to charge tax but the gratuity is up to the person buying the drink.

But I would get some clarification on it all.  But no matter what a cash bar is a no-no so even if the drinks cost more with a hosted bar you just have to accept that and maybe limit your options to beer and wine to stay within budget.

Have you considered just a hosted bar that you pay for per person instead of consumption based?  Depending on your crowd paying per person could possibly be cheaper then going with consumption based.

WildMagelet

Maggie0829 said:

Well the 20% service charge could be gratuity, but double check that.  And tax is just expected.  For a cash bar they would still need to charge tax but the gratuity is up to the person buying the drink.

But I would get some clarification on it all.  But no matter what a cash bar is a no-no so even if the drinks cost more with a hosted bar you just have to accept that and maybe limit your options to beer and wine to stay within budget.

Have you considered just a hosted bar that you pay for per person instead of consumption based?  Depending on your crowd paying per person could possibly be cheaper then going with consumption based.

Well, yeah, I never considered a cash bar, but I was just looking at it from a comparison point.

She sent back clarification and took the service charge off of there all together.  Apparently it was a mistake, which puts the the pricing more comparative (only $.05-$.20 difference, it looks like they just rounded up for their cash clients).

They gave me open bar pricing as well, but what we go off of will depend on how long we decide to have our reception, as two free drinks are included with our dinner package pricing.

Thanks for the insight