Catering tastings: what they cost and how to charge

A tasting costs about as much as cooking a tiny event: ingredients bought in small quantities, several hours of your kitchen and the meeting with the client. Work out that cost, multiply it by how many tastings it takes to win one booking, and decide from that number. One way to protect your time without putting off good clients is to charge for the tasting and credit it against the event if they book within a deadline.

What a tasting costs

Add four things:

• Ingredients. Buying for five portions costs more per portion than buying for a hundred. You cannot buy 100 g of ground beef for two sliders or three spoons of cream cheese for two mini cheesecakes; you buy the smallest pack and the rest sits in the fridge.
• Your time. Prep, which takes almost as long for small portions as for big ones, plus the meeting: talking through the menu, answering questions, noting changes.
• Presentation. Nice plates, napkins, sometimes containers if the client takes something home.
• Gas, oven and travel. If the tasting is at the venue, add the trip.

The samples you hand out at a market or to a new café account are something else; the guide on samples and giveaways covers how to keep that spending in check. A tasting is for a client who has already asked for a quote and is deciding.

The number that matters: tastings per booking

Record every tasting and whether it became a booking. If one in three tastings turns into an event, every booked event costs you three tastings. That cost comes out of the margin on the event you did win.

Three ways to handle it

1. Free. Attracts more undecided clients, and also people who just want a nice lunch. Every tasting without a booking is pure cost.
2. Charged, no credit. Filters out the curious, but can put off good clients who are comparing caterers.
3. Charged and credited against the event. The client pays for the tasting and, if they book within a deadline, the fee comes off the total. Clients who book pay nothing extra; clients who do not cover most of your cost.

Worked example: a wedding tasting

A couple planning a 120-guest wedding asks for a tasting for two of four dishes: slider burgers, wood-fired pizza bites, a grain salad and mini cheesecakes.

Your time: 2.5 hours of prep plus a 1-hour meeting.

From your own records, one in three tastings becomes a booking.

If tastings are free: each booked event costs you 3 × 171.50 = $514.50 in tastings.

If you charge $100 and credit it when they book within 14 days:

• The couple who books pays $100 and gets it back off the event. For you, that tasting still costs $171.50.
• The two couples who do not book pay $100 each. Your net cost: 2 × (171.50 − 100) = $143.00.
• Cost per booked event: 171.50 + 143 = $314.50.

The difference: 514.50 − 314.50 = $200 less for every event you book. If the wedding leaves you $3,500 of contribution margin, free tastings take $514.50 of it; charged and credited, $314.50.

To cook exact portions for two from your event recipe, the recipe scaler scales your quantities to the number of portions you need.

Limits worth writing down

• When it is offered: only after you have sent the quote, so the client already knows the price per head. The guide on quoting catering per person covers that step.
• How many people: two, or whatever number you choose. Each extra person is charged separately.
• How many dishes: the ones on the menu they are choosing from, with a maximum.
• Credit deadline: book within 14 days and the fee is credited; after that, it is not.
• One per event: a second tasting is charged in full.

Put it in the quote or in the message where you book the tasting. It saves arguments later.

What to record after every tasting

Keep a simple log, in a notebook or a spreadsheet:

• Date, client and type of event.
• Dishes tasted and what the tasting actually cost you.
• What they changed: less chilli, a different side, a bigger main portion.
• Whether they booked, and how many days later.

After ten or twelve tastings you will know how many it takes to win an event, which dishes win people over and whether your tasting cost is creeping up. The changes the client asked for go straight into the event recipe, so the per-guest cost in the final quote is right.

When to give it away

Sometimes it makes sense: a large, high-margin event, a corporate client who could bring repeat orders, or a quiet month when your kitchen is idle anyway. Do it as a decision with the cost in front of you, and not out of habit. To see how tastings fit into the rest of selling events, read the catering and events guide.

Do it with the calculator

Load the tasting dishes into the food cost calculator with the quantities you actually buy; you will see the real cost of the tasting and how it compares with the margin on the event.