Cans of drinks!

Most calculators recommend accounting for 2 drinks pp for the first hour, then one drink per person, per hour after that. If you're having a one hour cocktail hour and a 4 hour reception, that would be 900 cans. That could be way over or under depending on your guest list, so I think this is a know your crowd kind of thing. You should definitely provide other non-alcoholic beverages as well.

We planned for 1 drink per hour per person, but I'm not sure how to split up kinds of beer & seltzer.

I think cans are totally fine, as are your drink choices as long as you're considering what your guests like. One thing to note is that the Truly cans are tall and skinny, so they'll fit in a koozie, but not tightly (if that matters to you). We're probably aiming for a drink an hour per person. There's really no right answer other than to look at calculators and think about whether the average person in your crowd (including someone like a heavily drinking cousin and a grandparent who won't drink any alcohol) will drink more than an average amount. You could even go down your whole guest list and make drink estimates per person.

I dont know about the numbers game with it but I would strongly consider including soda. I know I always get to be the DD for weddings (mainly bc it's always open beer and wine and I'm a liquor girl!) And if my only option was water I would not be thrilled.

Are the beers and seltzer’s all the alcohol you’ll be providing?
Many calculators say to plan for 2 drinks per person for the 1st hour, and 1 per person per hour for the remaining hours, so that’s about 6 drinks. We knew we had a crowd of big drinks, so, we rounded UP, and used 7 drinks per person as a rough guide and erred on the side of overbuying when possible.

we bought for 125, but did beer(&cider) and wine, and select liquors for more or less a full bar. So, we did 12 cases of craft beer (couple varieties: ipa, Pilsner, wheat, and a hard cider), then a couple cases of bud light (maybe 2-4? I’m not sure. We’re a craft beer crowd but wanted to make sure we had the option for those that weren’t)...and then we had like 10 cases of wine and 10+ bottles of liquor. Our guests did pretty good work on it!! (Made a few returns and has a few things we kept, but I just didn’t want to risk running out !)

A limited bar is certainly okay, and you certainly dont need liquor, but I would encourage you to make sure you have something for everyone. I’d consider adding a non-light beer or a wine option, depending on your crowd. But of course you know your crowd better than anyone (😜I don’t like any of the listed beverages haha but I don’t think I’m invited to your wedding! Haha— but my caution is that they all seem to fall within a similar grouping to me [light] so if anyone doesn’t like the light stuff, they might not be thrilled with the variety...then again we took a gamble on a wheat beer bc we were told it was good for a summer crowd [and I could come up with at least 3 people I know drink wheat beers], even though it’s not really our thing, and it wasn’t a huge hit [i think we’ve only finally just used up the last of it, a year later ...our wheat drinking friends were all drinking liquor that day! Haha])

W hen we were figuring out how much to buy and of what, we went down the whole guest list, making note of what each person tends to drink and their general rate of consumption (if they’re light medium or heavy drinkers!), and it really helped us come up with a reasonable list — we used that rule of 6 drinks when considering rate (thinking a light drinker may have 2 or 3, average 5 or 6, and heavy 8+)— as much of a chore as it was, I really think pouring over our guestlist really helped in our alcohol shopping! (Lol it became kind of a game for me when the day came and I saw what everyone chose— lol!)

I think this is a good idea! I was considering it myself. I would definitely maybe get some of those reds apples/strawberries or some twisted teas or seagrams for those that aren't beer drinkers. And some coke and sprite would definitely be needed for none alcoholic.

I would definitely get some soda and water.

You may also want to add in some canned wine (there are lots of fun options right now).

I would also suggest that instead of miller lite and bud lite, you pick just one of those and then something a little different like a APA, amber, or just a stronger flavor like Sam Adams. I know ppl get really intense about liking one over the other, but really, bud lite and miller lite are so similar it seems silly to me to have both.

PP's have numbers covered!

View Quoted Comment Yeah I would get pop and water as well. I just feel like paying for a bar and a beverage service can be so pricey especially since my venue has metal basins to rent to put drinks in.

This is EXACTLY what we are doing. I have a wedding of 100, 75 of which can drink. I spent 400 on alcohol with a mix of that being canned beer, seltzers, etc and then maybe 100 of it was on wine bottles.

everyone I've asked said we will have more than enough.. when I look at it, it doesn't seem like much but we get married saturday so if you remind me, ill let you know!!

View Quoted Comment Awesome, I will for sure message back if I remember. Thank you!!