limited bar cost

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

So this isn't an etiquette question but I know there are a lot of ladies on here that are already married that could maybe help me out.

Anyone have a limited bar; beer & wine only or beer,wine & signature drink and willing to share how much it was and how many guests you had?

In my social circle everyone has cash bars so I never realized this was rude. So we booked our venue thinking maybe we could do some time of open bar. The options for our venue are either cash bar, or different options for a hosted bar but it's by consumption. After I came here and found out cash bars were rude I decided I wanted to do beer, wine, sig drink but we have a very big drinking crowd and just imagining what the final total will be at the end of the night is scaring the shit out of me.

I know every crowd is different but I thought maybe I could get a general idea of costs based on others' experiences.

Thanks!

beethery · October 2014

lavenderfields13 said:

So this isn't an etiquette question but I know there are a lot of ladies on here that are already married that could maybe help me out.
Anyone have a limited bar; beer & wine only or beer,wine & signature drink and willing to share how much it was and how many guests you had?

In my social circle everyone has cash bars so I never realized this was rude. So we booked our venue thinking maybe we could do some time of open bar. The options for our venue are either cash bar, or different options for a hosted bar but it's by consumption. After I came here and found out cash bars were rude I decided I wanted to do beer, wine, sig drink but we have a very big drinking crowd and just imagining what the final total will be at the end of the night is scaring the shit out of me.
I know every crowd is different but I thought maybe I could get a general idea of costs based on others' experiences.
Thanks!

As long as whatever you do is completely hosted, you're good here. You can host beer/wine/sig drink, or just beer/wine/soda if you want. You can even have a dry wedding, and if anyone bitches, they're the dink, not you.

Don't do open bar and then limited. Also, don't do open, followed by cash. Just host what you can afford, and that is 100% good.

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

Sorry, I probably explained it wrong.

The plan is to offer just beer, wine & a signature drink the whole night. Nothing more and no cash bar.

I know this is less expensive than having a full open bar but I'm thinking it will still be pretty costly so I wanted to see how much other people ended up paying for a similar set up.

ETA: by nothing more I mean nothing more for alcoholic beverages. We'll have soda, water, etc of course

theartistformerlyknownas · October 2014

Yep, what you've explained is perfectly fine, etiquette-wise.

I can't help with cost - my bar was open beer/liquor/wine by consumption for 200 people. Aaaaand cost nearly $7,000. So you should be somewhere south of that.

beethery · October 2014

lavenderfields13 said:

Sorry, I probably explained it wrong.
The plan is to offer just beer, wine & a signature drink the whole night. Nothing more and no cash bar.
I know this is less expensive than having a full open bar but I'm thinking it will still be pretty costly so I wanted to see how much other people ended up paying for a similar set up.

ETA: by nothing more I mean nothing more for alcoholic beverages. We'll have soda, water, etc of course

Then you, madame, are in the clear! Go on with your bad self!

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

@lolo883 thanks for your input. I'm hoping to stay under 5k but we know people that drink beer like water! Most of our guests are not used to open bar so I'm wondering if they're just going to go crazy ordering drinks!

JaxInBlue · October 2014

There's a calculator here (<--clicky) that is meant to help you figure out how much alcohol to buy. However, I'd guess once you work out the formula using beer/wine/sig drink, you could use your venue's price list to get an approximate cost, whether your venue will charge you by the drink or by the bottle opened. It won't be perfect, and you will still need to add applicable taxes, service charges, etc., but you might get a more useful working number. And then maybe add 5% to pad your budget a bit.

Fran1985 · October 2014

@lolo833 mind sharing what the price per drink was and if your crowd is big drinkers? I am trying to figure out the same calculations- also hoping itll be close to 5k or less. OP I am doing beer, wine, and two signature drinks for my wedding in two weeks on a consumption basis. Remind me sometime in late november and I'll come back with the total cost

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

@Fran1985 thanks I'll definitely check back with you.

My wedding isn't for 8 more months but I'm already literally having nightmares about the bar tab. I had a dream the other night that it was only the end of cocktail hour and it was already $8400 lol

theartistformerlyknownas · October 2014

Fran1985 said:

@lolo833 mind sharing what the price per drink was and if your crowd is big drinkers? I am trying to figure out the same calculations- also hoping itll be close to 5k or less. OP I am doing beer, wine, and two signature drinks for my wedding in two weeks on a consumption basis. Remind me sometime in late november and I'll come back with the total cost

@Fran1985 we were charged by the bottle for beer ($5 domestic, $6 imported) and wine ($32, $45 for champagne) and by the 10th of a bottle for hard liquor ($135 for the full bottle). We had about 15-20 non-drinkers but they were balanced out by about the same number of heavy drinkers. I heard after the fact that the bartenders were pouring REALLY strong. The venue coordinator estimated $20/pp in our initial charge, and we came home from honeymoon to an additional $2800 bill. :-p

annieandandy2014 · October 2014

My venue said approximately $25 per person.. I guess the people who have one diet coke make up for the people who have 8 cosmos??? I'm scared of my bar bill too, and I told the venue that I would decide day of if I am going to do beer/wine or full...(They only offer consumption per drink - betwen $5/7)

Fran1985 · October 2014

lolo883 said:

Fran1985 said:

@lolo833 mind sharing what the price per drink was and if your crowd is big drinkers? I am trying to figure out the same calculations- also hoping itll be close to 5k or less. OP I am doing beer, wine, and two signature drinks for my wedding in two weeks on a consumption basis. Remind me sometime in late november and I'll come back with the total cost

@Fran1985 we were charged by the bottle for beer ($5 domestic, $6 imported) and wine ($32, $45 for champagne) and by the 10th of a bottle for hard liquor ($135 for the full bottle). We had about 15-20 non-drinkers but they were balanced out by about the same number of heavy drinkers. I heard after the fact that the bartenders were pouring REALLY strong. The venue coordinator estimated $20/pp in our initial charge, and we came home from honeymoon to an additional $2800 bill. :-p

Thanks! This is really helpful for me and makes me hopeful- we have less people (145) and beer is 3.5, wine between 4.5-6.5 a glass, and we are doing just 2 mixed drinks for 5.5 a glass. we do have some heavy drinkers though. I've budgeted 6k for an estimate so I am hoping its less than that.

jenijoyk · October 2014

OP, I'm doing beer/sangria/wine/champagne only, on a consumption basis. My wedding is the 18th. If you remind me, I'll let you know what the total ended up being. We'll pay $5 per drink. Non-alcholic drinks are included in our dinner cost, so those won't be added into the bar tab. We were expecting 150 guests, but now we're down to 130. About half are heavy drinkers. The other half are very dainty drinkers.

Our caterer suggested we pay her $2,000 ahead of time, and we'll give our DOC our credt card the night of for everything over (with updates from her, of course). We have the venue until 11:30, but can end early if we have a panic attack over some outrageous bar tab. But I doubt I'll care the night of if the party is still going. And I doubt we'll end up paying more than $5k, if that. But I could be surprised!

wrigleyville · October 2014

Is there any chance they'll let you pay per person? I ask because, with consumption bars, you run the risk of people trying a drink, not liking it, and ordering another one right away.

People also set their drink down, lose track of it, and simply order another one. They also do that if their drink gets too warm and/or watered down.

Paying a set price per person can often save you money. It also helps prevent worrying about how much you'll owe, since you'll know as soon as you get your final head count.

jynxiie · October 2014

Our open bar is $22/person for 100 people. Would it ease your mind having it switched to an open bar? Because for us it worth it so we'd know how much it would be at the end of the night and it looks like that is what it will cost you anyways.

Liatris2010 · October 2014

I would ask your venue what the bar bill usually looks like for a party of your size. They should know.

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

@jenijoyk thanks I will be back to ask you as well

@wrigleyville @jynxiie our venue only allows cash bar or we pay by consumption (or up to a certain dollar amount/time, then switch to cash)

I love my venue but I've tried looking around at other ones now just to try to find ones that have a price per person. Most in my area only do cash or by consumption. The ones that have prices per person have much more expensive food than mine and the bar per person is usually $40 p/p so it's not any cheaper.

MegEn1 · October 2014

Hmm, now I'm getting nervous. We are able to buy our liquor wholesale and bring it in ourselves, and we budgeted $3,000 for 150 people. Well, originally it was 130 people so I guess the price will go up. We're hoping things like kegs help keep the price down...

penguin44 · October 2014

MegEn1 said:
Hmm, now I'm getting nervous. We are able to buy our liquor wholesale and bring it in ourselves, and we budgeted $3,000 for 150 people. Well, originally it was 130 people so I guess the price will go up. We're hoping things like kegs help keep the price down...

You'll be fine. I did this. We had two types of beer, four types of wine, vodka, gin, and whiskey. Plus tons of mixers. We spent less than $2,000 and had a bunch leftover. I had about 120 people.

Make sure you use a drink calculator or ask your caterer for quantities to buy.

LittlePeachBlossom · October 2014

I would do beer and wine ONLY with no signature drink. People generally know what beer and wine they like so they'll stick to their tried and true without experimenting. If you offer a signature drink, people would most likely want to try it even if it's not something they normally drink. There will likely be more waste because of this.

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

LittlePeachBlossom said:

I would do beer and wine ONLY with no signature drink. People generally know what beer and wine they like so they'll stick to their tried and true without experimenting. If you offer a signature drink, people would most likely want to try it even if it's not something they normally drink. There will likely be more waste because of this.

This is a good point. I planned on having some kind of drink with liquor that I liked because I don't like beer or wine. I plan on having smirnoff ice too since those are close in price to beer and I like those.

melbenso · October 2014

We did an open bar with limited options (5 wine types, champagne, 10 beer types, various well and mid-level liquors, plus pop and juice). It was a consumption bar. We had 110 people at our reception. About 15-20 of them were either under drinking age or were not drinking alcohol due to pregnancy, medical condition, religious belief, just not feeling it, etc. ETA - most of our guests were moderate drinkers, with a couple of light drinkers and a handful of heavy drinkers.

Our bar tab was about $2300 (including pop and juice). Bar was open for roughly 6 hours. Average drink price was somewhere around $4.50.

Another thing to take into consideration when factoring cost is where you are having your ceremony. The fact that we got married in a rural area not too far outside a central mid-western city certainly cut down on our bar costs. I'm sure average drink price of $4.50 for an alcoholic drink would not be even remotely feasible in a large city.

futuremrsr2015 · October 2014

lavenderfields13 said:

LittlePeachBlossom said:

I would do beer and wine ONLY with no signature drink. People generally know what beer and wine they like so they'll stick to their tried and true without experimenting. If you offer a signature drink, people would most likely want to try it even if it's not something they normally drink. There will likely be more waste because of this.

This is a good point. I planned on having some kind of drink with liquor that I liked because I don't like beer or wine. I plan on having smirnoff ice too since those are close in price to beer and I like those.

I second the smirnoff ice, I can't stand beer or wine (my mother is the same) so I would be SOL.

We asked for an estimate for open bar and the coordinator actually told us to budget 2 drinks pp for the whole thing (9 hrs) at 150 people the bill would be $4,500 if everyone only had two drinks the whole night. They do not have a per person option and you are not allowed to bring your own alcohol except the wine for dinner and if you want them to bring in something they don't normally have she said take the price at the LCBO double it and add a dollar.

larrygaga · October 2014

Between the booze price in your area, venue charges, crowd type and size, nobody will probably be able to give you an accurate estimate. I would ask the venue and see what the bill ends up averaging out to in past weddings. They should know!

sarawifenow · October 2014

We are having 96 guests at our wedding. Out of these, 80 are above 21 and will drink. The bar will be open for 3 1/2 hours. There will be two types of beer, two kinds of wine, and champagne for mimosas/toasts. Total it is costing us about $500.

LittlePeachBlossom · October 2014

futuremrsr2015 said:

lavenderfields13 said:

LittlePeachBlossom said:

I would do beer and wine ONLY with no signature drink. People generally know what beer and wine they like so they'll stick to their tried and true without experimenting. If you offer a signature drink, people would most likely want to try it even if it's not something they normally drink. There will likely be more waste because of this.

This is a good point. I planned on having some kind of drink with liquor that I liked because I don't like beer or wine. I plan on having smirnoff ice too since those are close in price to beer and I like those.

I second the smirnoff ice, I can't stand beer or wine (my mother is the same) so I would be SOL.

We asked for an estimate for open bar and the coordinator actually told us to budget 2 drinks pp for the whole thing (9 hrs) at 150 people the bill would be $4,500 if everyone only had two drinks the whole night. They do not have a per person option and you are not allowed to bring your own alcohol except the wine for dinner and if you want them to bring in something they don't normally have she said take the price at the LCBO double it and add a dollar.

Yes, Smirnoff sounds good to me too. I also like beer and wine though so I'd be covered either way. Make the Smirnoff ice the signature drink. Not sure how to word it but maybe something like "Bride's selection" and "Groom's choice". List your Smirnoff ice and list the groom's favorite beer. (or 2nd favorite if it's cheaper

Hey you gotta keep costs down.)

lavenderfields13 · October 2014

I'm going to ask the venue coordinator for some averages of past guests' bills when we meet with her in a couple of months. The only thing she's told me so far is that a recent couple had a completely open bar (beer, wine, liquor) for about 130 people and it was about $5000, and I think that's before the extra 28% that gets added on.

Our list is at about 160 now and we have some heavy drinkers.

I live in Boston and our wedding will be in RI so costs are definitely higher than in other parts of the country. It's interesting (and kind of depressing in some cases!) to see the different prices for other areas.

simcal18 · October 2014

penguin44 said:

Hmm, now I'm getting nervous. We are able to buy our liquor wholesale and bring it in ourselves, and we budgeted $3,000 for 150 people. Well, originally it was 130 people so I guess the price will go up. We're hoping things like kegs help keep the price down...
You'll be fine. I did this. We had two types of beer, four types of wine, vodka, gin, and whiskey. Plus tons of mixers. We spent less than $2,000 and had a bunch leftover. I had about 120 people. Make sure you use a drink calculator or ask your caterer for quantities to buy.

This. Buying your liquor wholesale is WAY different price-wise than paying for drinks at through a bar the venue provides. We pay our catering company for the bartenders and any specialty beverage mixers. But we're getting our liquor, beer, wine, bar fruit, ice, and mixers from a wholesaler, and for pretty decent alcohol we've been quoted around $3000 for 180 guests, and we're expected to get about $1000 back in unopened returns. And this is just outside of a major northeast city.

Jessie42613 · October 2014

futuremrsr2015 said:

lavenderfields13 said:

LittlePeachBlossom said:

I would do beer and wine ONLY with no signature drink. People generally know what beer and wine they like so they'll stick to their tried and true without experimenting. If you offer a signature drink, people would most likely want to try it even if it's not something they normally drink. There will likely be more waste because of this.

This is a good point. I planned on having some kind of drink with liquor that I liked because I don't like beer or wine. I plan on having smirnoff ice too since those are close in price to beer and I like those.

I second the smirnoff ice, I can't stand beer or wine (my mother is the same) so I would be SOL.

We asked for an estimate for open bar and the coordinator actually told us to budget 2 drinks pp for the whole thing (9 hrs) at 150 people the bill would be $4,500 if everyone only had two drinks the whole night. They do not have a per person option and you are not allowed to bring your own alcohol except the wine for dinner and if you want them to bring in something they don't normally have she said take the price at the LCBO double it and add a dollar.

Wait, what?? At 2 drinks per person.. 150 people.. $4500.. that's $15 PER DRINK aaand is insanely overpriced.

theartistformerlyknownas · October 2014

futuremrsr2015 said:

lavenderfields13 said:

LittlePeachBlossom said:

I would do beer and wine ONLY with no signature drink. People generally know what beer and wine they like so they'll stick to their tried and true without experimenting. If you offer a signature drink, people would most likely want to try it even if it's not something they normally drink. There will likely be more waste because of this.

This is a good point. I planned on having some kind of drink with liquor that I liked because I don't like beer or wine. I plan on having smirnoff ice too since those are close in price to beer and I like those.

I second the smirnoff ice, I can't stand beer or wine (my mother is the same) so I would be SOL.

We asked for an estimate for open bar and the coordinator actually told us to budget 2 drinks pp for the whole thing (9 hrs) at 150 people the bill would be $4,500 if everyone only had two drinks the whole night. They do not have a per person option and you are not allowed to bring your own alcohol except the wine for dinner and if you want them to bring in something they don't normally have she said take the price at the LCBO double it and add a dollar.

This is way off. The rule of thumb is 2 drinks for the first hour, and a drink an hour after that.

Also, is your reception actually 9 hours long, or is that the whole time including your ceremony? That's insanely long. Most receptions are 4-5 hours, max.

vulpiepop · October 2014

Even a beer and wine bar is expensive at my venue (around $30 per person). FI and I are going back and forth whether to suck up the cost or to just have a dry wedding. Right now we're leaning towards a dry wedding but that can very well change. There's no way we could afford an open bar with liquor and cocktails though.

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