Drink calculator?

scissotron

I have found a lot of alcohol calculators, but am having trouble figuring out how much I'll need in the way of mixers.  Sweet and Sour, Cokes, whatever else is a common mixer.  I'm thinking for my 100 person guest list, about 200 beers, 2 bottles each of rum, whiskey, tequila, vodka, and about 8 bottles of wine.  That's about what I've come up with, knowing my guests.  I can't figure out how much I'll need for mixers, though.  HELP!!  

lyndausvi

The standard are coke, diet coke, sprite, ginger ale, tonic, club soda, pineapple, OJ, cranberry.

What does your family drink?  2 bottles of vodka would not even last cocktail hour with my group of friends.

scissotron

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_reception-ideas_drink-calculator?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:5Discussion:d99b754a-16b3-458b-ab25-b630fec6e029Post:24fa4255-ad36-4b28-a4c0-785cc177fc43">Re: Drink calculator?</a>:
[QUOTE]The standard are coke, diet coke, sprite, ginger ale, tonic, club soda, pineapple, OJ, cranberry. What does your family drink?  2 bottles of vodka would not even last cocktail hour with my group of friends.
Posted by lyndausvi[/QUOTE]<div>
</div><div>haha, i can only think of like two of my friends that drink vodka.  i think i underestimated on the whiskey, though, and i KNOW i underestimated on the beer.

</div>

lyndausvi

we bought our stuff at a store that allowed you to return all unopened bottles.  So we over ordered on everything. 

scissotron

thats a good idea.  do you know how many(in proportion to the liquor) mixers did you get?

casyme

Here's some math that might help you:  We're having a four-hour evening reception for 90 people.  We'll have a mix of complete non-alcoholic drinkers and fairly heavy drinkers, with everyone else in-between.  So, we're budgeting one drink per person per hour, or 4 drinks total.  Based on everyone's collective tastes, we think 2/3 of those will be beer or wine and the other 1/3 cocktails.  So that means we need, on average:

- 30 beers per hour [120 total for the evening]
- 30 wine servings per hour (which means 6 bottles per hour, because you get 6 glasses per bottle) [24 bottles totals for the evening]
-  30 hard drinks per hour (which means 2 bottles of liquor per hour, since you get about 20 drinks out of a 1 liter bottle).  This one is harder to total for the whole evening because you don't know what kinds of liquor people will be drinking, so I would stay on the safe side and budget at least 1 bottle of each kind per hour, and more if your crowd leans toward one type or another.  So, that means a total of 4 bottles of vodka, 4 of whiskey, 4 of rum, 4 of tequila; for my crowd, I might finetune by deleting one of the rums and tequilas and adding more vodka and whiskey. 
-  and at least some mixers for those 30 hard drinks for those who aren't drinking straight liquor (if you assume average 3 oz per mixed drink, that means you should have about 90 ounces total per hour - oj, tonic, sodas, etc. [A total of 360 ounces for the evening])  And then round up on these if you have many people who will not be drinking alcohol at all - maybe up to 140 ounces per hour [a total of 560 oz for the evening].

And THEN, to be safe, I would tack on an extra 25% of EVERYTHING, because you can't plan perfectly.

scissotron

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_reception-ideas_drink-calculator?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:5Discussion:d99b754a-16b3-458b-ab25-b630fec6e029Post:a9847c36-5887-4204-93b8-2c3308d76102">Re: Drink calculator?</a>:
[QUOTE]Here's some math that might help you:  We're having a four-hour evening reception for 90 people.  We'll have a mix of complete non-alcoholic drinkers and fairly heavy drinkers, with everyone else in-between.  So, we're budgeting one drink per person per hour, or 4 drinks total.  Based on everyone's collective tastes, we think 2/3 of those will be beer or wine and the other 1/3 cocktails.  So that means we need, on average: - 30 beers per hour [120 total for the evening] - 30 wine servings per hour (which means 6 bottles per hour, because you get 6 glasses per bottle) [24 bottles totals for the evening] -  30 hard drinks per hour (which means 2 bottles of liquor per hour, since you get about 20 drinks out of a 1 liter bottle).  This one is harder to total for the whole evening because you don't know what kinds of liquor people will be drinking, so I would stay on the safe side and budget at least 1 bottle of each kind per hour, and more if your crowd leans toward one type or another.  So, that means a total of 4 bottles of vodka, 4 of whiskey, 4 of rum, 4 of tequila; for my crowd, I might finetune by deleting one of the rums and tequilas and adding more vodka and whiskey.  -  and at least some mixers for those 30 hard drinks for those who aren't drinking straight liquor (if you assume average 3 oz per mixed drink, that means you should have about 90 ounces total per hour - oj, tonic, sodas, etc. [A total of 360 ounces for the evening])  And then round up on these if you have many people who will not be drinking alcohol at all - maybe up to 140 ounces per hour [a total of 560 oz for the evening]. And THEN, to be safe, I would tack on an extra 25% of EVERYTHING, because you can't plan perfectly.
Posted by casyme[/QUOTE]

<div>
</div><div>thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!!  thats pretty much exactly what i needed!!  (someone to do the math and spell it out for me)  haha.</div>

lyndausvi

casyme has some good suggestions.  Although IME people drink 2-3 drinks per hour for the first 1-2 hours and then 1-2 drinks per hours after that.    

scissotron

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_reception-ideas_drink-calculator?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:5Discussion:d99b754a-16b3-458b-ab25-b630fec6e029Post:db843ea2-f6bf-4448-a1a6-1ff959120ff0">Re: Drink calculator?</a>:
[QUOTE]casyme has some good suggestions.  Although IME people drink 2-3 drinks per hour for the first 1-2 hours and then 1-2 drinks per hours after that.    
Posted by lyndausvi[/QUOTE]

<div>good point, people do start off strong, usually.</div>

lyndausvi

yep..  If you are having a cocktail hour people are good for 2-3 drinks during those.  Dinner people tend to slow down a little, a drink or maybe 2.  Then after dinner is where things go in opposite directions.  Your drinkers will go back to 2 drinks an hour, your non-to-light drinkers will have one or even stop so they balance each other out.

JHandMP2012

hi guys there's a calculator here:  http://wedding.theknot.com/wedding-planning/wedding-reception-planning.aspx