How to Serve Alcohol at a Wedding: Booking a Bar Package or DIY?

Once you’ve figured out your menu, you need to start thinking about the drinks for your wedding. How you serve the alcohol at your wedding depends on your venue and the type of food service you’ve booked. If you’ve booked a full service caterer or venue, you’ll need to purchase your bar package from them. If your wedding is at a space that allows DIY you’ll have a lot more options. Start by deciding how much you want to spend on drinks for your wedding reception.

How Much Should You Budget For the Bar at Your Wedding?

Most couples spend 20% of their budget on the bar. Choose the type of bar service that matches your budget. If you’ve got a bigger budget, you’ll probably book your bar service with your caterer. If your budget is smaller, or if you want to save money, think about doing some DIY.

How Much Does a Bar Package Cost For a Wedding?

The actual price depends on where you live, the time of year, your venue and your caterer. If you’ve booked a caterer for your wedding meal, they’ll also offer you a bar package. It’s usually a price per person per hour, with a 3 or 4 hour minimum.

In some areas, caterers can charge as little as $15 to $20 per person, per hour for a bar package. In bigger cities the average is closer to $20 or $30 per person per hour. In the most expensive cities, like New York and San Francisco bar packages are a lot higher - expect to start at $35 or $40 per person per hour.

How Does a Bar Package Work at a Wedding Reception?

If you’ve hired a caterer, or if your food and drinks are done in house by your venue, you’ll need to work with their packages. Most will offer you a low, medium or high priced package. The lower prices will have fewer choices and generic alcohol. If you want more choices and top shelf liquor you’ll have to choose the higher priced packages.

The caterer will set up your bar to work with the timing of your reception. Most venues will open the bar for the cocktail hour, then close it during dinner. The bar will reopen after dinner until the end of the reception. For example, a 4 hour service would start with the cocktail hour from 6:00 till 7:00. The bar will close for an hour during dinner. Then reopen for the remaining 3 hours from 8:00 till 11:00.

Trying to figure out your caterer’s bar service? This post explains the different types: Best Bar Service For Your Wedding: Open Bar vs Host Bar vs Cash Bar

Common Terms and Fees in Your Catering Contract

Guaranteed Minimums:

Most caterers include a minimum number of guests for a meal and beverage package. Some caterers will have a minimum dollar amount instead of a minimum number of guests.

Gratuities:

Some caterers will automatically include the gratuity. Expect an additional 15% to 20% to be added to your bill.

Corkage Fee:

If you’re bringing your own wine or champagne most caterers will charge you a few dollars for each bottle that they open and serve. This is called the corkage fee. If you want to save money by bringing your own alcohol, check your contract first to see how much the corkage fee will cost.

Sales Tax:

Depending on where you live, sales tax will add another 5% to 18%. Remember to include the tax in your prices when you’re working on your budget.

DIY The Bar For Your Wedding Reception

If you want to save some money, you can DIY the bar for your wedding reception. First, check that your venue will allow it. Then check your local regulations. Most cities have laws around serving alcohol. You’ll probably be required to hire certified bartenders and purchase liability insurance. Your venue should be able to give you all this information.

If it’s allowed at your venue, you can buy the alcohol and mixers that you’ll need and bring them to the venue yourself. After your reception you can return unopened bottles for refunds. As for the opened bottles - you can bring them home and stock your home bar.

How Much Alcohol Do You Need For Your Wedding?

If you’re having 100 guests or so, you’ll need a lot of bottles! First, decide what you’re going to serve. Start with your beer and wine. If you’ve got the budget, it’s nice to offer a dark beer and a light beer. Plus a red wine and white wine.

If your budget is bigger, you can add one or two signature drinks. These are cocktails that can be pre-mixed and served individually or in pitchers. By offering signature drinks instead of a full bar you’ll be able to save money. You’ll only need to buy a few types of liquor and mixers to make all the drinks. You might be able to hire less bartenders, too. It’s a lot easier to pour out drinks than it is to mix individual ones.

If you’ve got the room in your budget, you can always set up the entire open bar with your own alcohol. The simplest bar is beer, wine and a few bottle of liquor, plus the mixers. You can go as elaborate as you’d like. If your budget allows you can purchase more liquor so your guests will have more choices.

Champagne toasts are completely optional. If you’d like to have one, you can save money by purchasing sparkling wine or prosecco instead of champagne. If you’re not into champagne, it’s perfectly fine to make toasts with whatever your guests are drinking.

How Do You Calculate Drinks For a Wedding?

Once you’ve decided what you’re serving, figure out how much you’ll need. You can do the math yourself with these numbers. Start by multiplying your number of guests by the number of hours in your reception. Then allow 1 drink per hour.

Example: 150 guests x 3 hours = 450 drinks

If you’re serving only wine and beer, it’s usually split 60% wine, 40% beer

From the example:

60% of 450 drinks = 270 glasses of wine
40% of 450 drinks = 180 beers

If you’re offering mixed drinks or cocktails as well as beer and wine, the ratio becomes 50% wine, 20% beer, 30% liquor

50% of 450 drinks = 225 glasses of wine
20% of 450 drinks = 90 beers
30% of 450 drinks = 135 mixed drinks

How Much Alcohol in a Bottle?

A bottle of wine 750mL = 5 glasses of wine
A bottle of champagne 750 mL = 6 to 8 glasses of champagne
A keg of beer = 165 beers (12 oz each)
A bottle of spirits 750mL = 12 mixed drinks

Wedding Alcohol Calculator

If you don’t want to do the math, you can figure it out the easy way! Here’s the simplest alcohol calculator ever Wedding Alcohol Calculator: DIY Wedding Drink Calculator

How to Stock the Bar For Your Wedding Reception

Once you know how much you need, what should you buy? If you only need two or three bottles of liquor, stick with the basics, usually whiskey, vodka and gin. By adding some mixers, your bartenders can make a huge variety of drinks from these three liquors. If you’re buying more bottles, you can choose some of your favourites and offer more variety. If your caterer’s not providing them, remember to get some non alcoholic drinks, some mixers and a few garnishes, too.

Alcohol to Buy For Your Wedding Bar

Champagne or Sparkling Wine
Red Wine
White Wine
Beer
Whiskey
Vodka
Gin
Bourbon
Rum
Scotch
Tequila
Brandy

Mixers and Garnishes For Your Wedding Bar

Oranges
Lemons
Limes
Cherries
Pineapple
Olives
Cocktail Onions
Water
Tonic
Club Soda
Cola & Diet Cola
Lemon Lime &
Diet Lemon Lime
Orange Juice
Cranberry Juice
Tomato Juice
Lemonade
Iced Tea
Coffee & Tea
Ice

Small Budget? Have a Brunch or Lunch Wedding

If you can’t fit a bar into your wedding budget, think about planning a different style reception. If you plan a brunch or lunch reception instead of a dinner dance, people won’t expect a full bar. Even if you offer alcohol, people will drink less than they would in the evening. If you’re on a super tight budget, you could plan a cake and punch reception and serve only a champagne toast.

Consider a Cocktail Party Wedding Reception

If your budget’s too small for a meal and alcohol, you can skip the meal. If you really want an evening reception, plan a cocktail party reception instead of a dinner dance. You’ll still spend a lot on the bar, but by serving only appetizers instead of dinner you can save enough money to cover the bar bill. Just make sure to either start your reception after dinner time or end it before dinner would start. That way your guests won’t expect a meal and will eat either before or after.

There’s lots of options for every budget, so take your time going through them. Remember to check your contracts and add up all the costs before you make your final decision. If you do the math you’ll be sure your getting the best bar for your money.