Posted by Sherri on March 14, 19100 at 05:14:34 :
In Reply to: Menu Pricing posted by Ron on March 13, 19100 at 18:40:43 :
Ron,
As to pricing, of course, you want to get what your market will allow -- what your customer will pay.
A menu similar to yours would be priced in our market at $14.95 per guest (minimum 100). It includes the cold hors (fruit, cheese and veg), three hot hors, two cold hors, dessert assortment. For the nicer hors, we have a higher prices up an upgrade sheet. We also have a couple basic menus priced at $10.95 and $12.95. Plus we have the Chef's Choice Menu priced at $9.95 where there are not choices the client makes, they leave it up to us. Believe it or not, we sell a lot of these.
Another thought is the per piece pricing structure. Have your menu printed on a page and under each menu item description, the per piece or dozen pricing for each. This is a wonderful way for the client to select a menu on his/her own. Of course, review it carefully when they place the order so that you can make suggestions. You wouldn't want the client to short him/her-self when placing an order.
We do an A, B and C menu for each "type" of catering. Menu B is the menu we hope to sell the most of and have the best price and profit built in. Then we modify Menu B to create a lower menu C and a higher menu A. With each menu, we have upgrade options available. When qualifying the client, if we believe that they do not fit into any of the menus, it is then when we do custom menus. On every custom proposal that we type out (in other words do not send a pre-printed menu) we give lots of options. This way we can shine above the competition. Usually, we only do custom menus if the client has a large event or a budget and expectations that do not fit into our printed menus. (We used to do custom menus all the time, but now with a sales staff, it is easier with "canned" menus) A lot of times, our chef will "do custom menus" but he has a custom menu he does over and over again. He selects nice menu items that he knows are profitable and uses them as his "standard custom menus."
By the way, the Mexican Pasta Salad sounds interesting. What is it?
It sounds like you do not have competitor caterers around who do the same thing or you would already have a pricing basis for your area. When we started out almost 6 years ago, we went along with the crowd. Now, we are a leader in this market and we end up setting the pricing and menu flavors that others caterers follow.
As for printed menus, we just printed our second edition of our corporate catering catalogue, 48 pages of menus for just about every type of catering need for our business clientelle. Talk about choices. Our customers just love it. Especially the menus where they can mix and match. This has been wonderful for those clients who use us several times a week.
Sherri