Buying drinks for my wedding how much wine and beer?
by techdude on Monday, April 18th, 2011 | 4 Comments
I’m just estimating. I’d like to invite about 60-75 people. and only buy beer and wine. How many bottles of wine should I buy and how many cases of beer should I get?
The reception would only be for 2-3 hours. Me and my fiance’ don’t have a lot of family at all. almost all of his family lives outside of the country and will not be attending.
thank you!
I would estimate 4 beers per person, if you are not certain how many beer drinkers, maybe 1/2 for beer so you would need 5 or 6 cases. Wine you need to calculate 2 – 3 glasses per person. A bottle will yield 4 glasses of wine. You will probably need 20 – 25 bottles of wine. Wine can get very expensive with the average price at $14 a bottle. You may want to consider a few other options. Vodka and whiskey go a long way. Hope that helps.
As a rule, most people, drink 2 drinks the first hour, then either slow down or speed up depending on the atmosphere–band/dj. Considering that a bottle of wine will pour 4-5 servings, depending on the pour, I would say 2 cases of wine and 4 cases of beer should be plenty. The tricky part of planning for your wedding is that you want to have enough of what people like to drink, so you really need to plan on having more than the actual amount needed. For example, you don’t want to run out of wine in the first hour because you underestimated the number of people who would drink it…and force them to drink beer or vice versa.
Also remember, people who do not normally drink sometimes try with either white or blush wine–so you may want to have more white and blush…this also depends on what region you live in.
For example, for 100 people:
Beer – Total 9 cases
Wine – Total 5-8 Cases
I would buy champagne instead of wine. Wine is an acquired taste and some people like red, then some like white. Then not to mention sweet or dry. Too many choices to make for me if it was my wedding. You can never go wrong with a lil bubbly either. I dont know how much for you to buy though maybe figure a bottle for 2-3 people. Maybe get extra? With wine you would have to buy red, white, sweet, semi sweet and etc…. think about that.
Oh if you get champagne dont forget to add strawberries to each glass to enhance the flavor of the champagne and fruit. Would be a nicer touch on the tables as well having fruit in the glasses….dont you think?
I was a bartender for 8 years, so I know this answer… It is subject to how much of a “drinking” crowd you have, but you know them better than me, so you can adjust up or down.
For beer, I would suggest one half barrell of beer – it contains approx 200 beers. That’s 3-4 beers each. If you are renting a hall, the hall should provide it. If you are providing it, get the barrell, a plastic tub to hold it in and two 20lb bags of ice to keep the beer cold and a tapper. It’s easy to set up.
Last thing to remember if at a hall – you tap it, you buy it. In other words, if you go through the beer and you need to buy more, remember that even if you only go through 10 glasses in that next keg, you pay for the whole thing.
For the wine – the person who said 3 to 4 glasses per person is correct. So, assuming that 60% will drink wine, you can estimate 36 to 40 bottles of wine. You also have to assume that most people will not mix beer and wine, unless wine is served with food. I’d get an even mix of Red and White. Cabernet, Merlot or Zinfandel for red and Chardonnay or Pinot Grigio for white – some decent wines that are NOT $14 a bottle are:
Charles Shaw (better known as Two Buck Chuck… Hey, don’t laugh, it’s only inexpensive wine because the owner of the winery stuck it to his wife in a divorce settlement. She gets half of everything, so he slashed his prices on pretty decent wine.)
Twin Fin – not bad wine for the price, especially when you’re footing the bill!
Tisdale is another decent wine that you can get at large stores (I think Costco, Sam’s, etc.)
Congratulations on your wedding!