diy beer/wine bar?

Here’s a few pictures that I hope 🤞🏾 help.

View Quoted Comment Thanks! I came across these on Pinterest as well, and they’re tough due to including liquor (which we aren’t doing for multiple reasons). I found a cool calculator for JUST beer and wine, an am hoping it’s accurate!! I am hoping that there are other couples on here doing something similar!

View Quoted Comment Do you mind sharing the link? We are doing just beer and wine as well!

Most people say 1 drink per guest per hour but 2 drinks for the first hour.

View Quoted Comment Oops 🙊 I’m sorry I couldn’t be more helpful Stephanie!

View Quoted Comment Thats what I’ve seen as well, but am torn because my friends can REALLY drink.. I don’t want I go overboard, but also don’t want to run out!!

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Here you go!! I loved this link, how do you guys think you’re going to handle serving?! I’d love to hear your plans, as it seems like this is definitely an atypical way to handle the whole Bar situation.

http://www.thealcoholcalculator.com/?config=smallwedding

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Look into buying from stores that accept returns

View Quoted Comment Thank you! We are actually hiring a bartender. We made the decision before we decided to cut liquor and my MIL offered to pay for them (it’s her friends) after we signed the contract. But with our guests, it’s better to have someone to cut people off when they need it than to let them serve themselves.

View Quoted Comment If you know your crowd to be heavy drinker I would look into getting 10-25% more than suggested by calculated and buy from somewhere that accepts returns

we are doing a full open bar but I have no clue what kind or how heavy of drinkers we have because we don’t really drink we never go out drinking with them lol

basically we started buying liquor 18 months before wedding at minimum of 1 bottle per month

we’re getting all mixers and beer (18 cases bottles in probably 10-18 types) right before (last 30 days) and we’re starting cases of wine at 6 months out 3 cases white and 3 red

thats actually tripling the beer and wine for several reasons

1 this is the south and beer is huge
2 according to most people I spoke with they would not have even 1 liquor drink per hour because they wouldn’t want to embarrass themselves but the same people feel that 4-6 beers per hour is like a party count

according to most sources wine is most popular wedding beverage


After the party

our plan is to retain the liquor bar for our household

we will also keep 2 unopened bottles of each type of wine

finally we will keep 6 pack of bottles from each type of beer remaining

after we “stock a home bar” from the leftovers anything still available will be parting gifts to anyone interested

guest list of 80 with 50 probable drinkers so we’re expecting serious leftovers lol... but realistically I don’t think there will be that much to stock off liquor bar except parishables which must always be restocked regardless and for our investment we will have thrown one of the best parties in the area and instead of having a very happy caterer on the way to the bank with a car full of alcohol I will be self serving beer and wine, paying a bar tender for shots, mixed and frozen drinks, and to keep beer and wine displays stocked back to full twice per hour, and have a very awesome home bar in addition to the extensive Lord of the rings and hobbit collections that we will have due to choosing collectible memorabilia as centerpieces instead of traditional displays

i feel it’s unique and fun

we are doing each table decorated to represent a place in middle earth

Our crowd would be considered fairly heavy drinkers. Mostly beer or Vodka mixed drinks.

We had 38 guests.

I bought two 36 packs of Coors light and a 12 pack of Heineken. I bought 2 large (Costco size) bottles of Vodka, 1 handle of Crown, all of the mixers (cranberry, orange juice, club soda, limes, etc). We also bought 3 cases of wine. 1 Chardonnay, 1 Zinfandel and 1 Sangiovese. I knew the Zin would go quick, since it is really good (our favorite), but I had no idea how quick! I regret not just buying 3 cases of Zin and a couple Chardonnay bottles, since I had so much of that left over.

We came home with 1 bottle of vodka, most of the Crown, a case of wine (which, like I said, if I would have bought more Zin, we would have come home with less). Oh and a 36 pack of beer. One of the heaviest beer drinkers is dealing with a bit of gout, so he was really taking it slow that night. And one of our female guests was not feeling well either. That changed the consumption considerably, since both of them like to DRINK.

That’s my issue! A few of my guests don’t drink, or don’t drink much anyways. The grand majority of them drink A LOT. And that’s fine!! Just want to make sure we don’t run out of booze!!

If your friends are heavy drinkers I would worry about a self-serve bar, people may end up sick from drinking too much, whereas with a bartender they’d be cut off before they got to that point.

Just something to think about, not sure if you had considered that!

I found this calculator and article pretty helpful https://apracticalwedding.com/wedding-alcohol-calculator/ .

Using this (rough) guideline we would have needed 1/4 of what they suggest here. We did increase the beers because of the crowd. For a three hour reception with 50 guests we bought 78 beers, 28 bottles of wine, and made a signature drink featuring vodka and champagne. We ended up with 8 leftover bottles of wine and 25 leftover beers, 1 leftover champagne. It was summer, and the lighter drinks, including the signature drink, were more popular than I thought they would be and I think that's why we had so much wine left.

I would price out a bartender, though. I know it varies, but ours wasn't too expensive and we were able to hire her through our caterer. I think that having a bartender also helps the drinks go further since people are likely to pour heavy for themselves, and just having to get a drink from someone also slows people down on their consumption.

We're purchasing our own alcohol and I've just been looking on pinterest for "stocking the bar" and it's some helpful charts on there.

View Quoted Comment I have thought about it, but I think with our group it will probably be alright. I’m not too worried! Thanks though!