How much should I budget for an open bar?

Have you talked to your venue/bartneding service? Many of them will charge a flat rate per person for an open bar. I think most of the venues I talked to were between $18-30 per person for an open bar. Think of it this way- with 5 hours, average 5 drinks per person. At a bar, they are $4 a drink, so $20 per person, plus tip for the bartender.

You also have to think about that since you are doing an open bar, people are going to be more than likely to order the top notch drinks that arent cheap, so your tab can run up quickly. My parents for their wedding had about the same amount of guests as yours and spent over $1000 in the first hour of the reception.

That is if they dont do a flat rate, like Meghan suggested

Yes, I have asked, and they do not do a flat rate. We can only run a tab. I wish I could do that. I hate not knowing how much it is going to cost!

I ran into this problem too right before the wedding (and got a lot of heated responses). I was worried about the unknown. The flat rate at our venue was wayyy to expensive. We ended up doing beer/wine and a cash bar for hard alcohol and still spent about $4000 (about 5 drinks/person) for 100 people

I have also thought of that, Kathryn. They said that they can work something out where if some orders a drink that costs over a certain dollar amount (that I specify), they don't let them order it and/or have them pay for it themselves but I wasn't sure how to go about that either. The whole point of doing an open bar is to avoid a cash bar (which I have no problem with but would like to host as much as possible) so doing it that way seems to be defeating the purpose.

If you can only run a tab- you can do an open bar until you hit a certian point, then it's a cash bar.

Or, you find another bartending service to work your event.

Oh and i forgot to mention, we did have a cap at 4000, which happened to hit right at the end of the reception (my coordinator came by and whispered it to me)..I told her to keep it open since it would probably just be a few drinks more

It is also an option to let them run a tab up to a certain amount that we can afford and have it transition to cash bar after that.

It's a country club so the venue, catering and bartending are all together. They have the best prices for the food so we chose them even though they don't offer a flat rate for alcohol.

If you can't do a flat rate, I think the best idea is to set a limit for the bar and go to cash after that limit is hit. I would be terrified of running an open tab. I've heard stories of couples who ended up with bills 2x (or more) of their budget!

I think maybe we will set a limit and go to cash bar after that. How would I word this on my website so that guests know to bring money for the cash bar part but also that more than just beer is hosted (somewhat)?

How do flat rates work, girls? 10 guests = XX amount of drinks, thererefore $$ is the flat rate, regardless of if guests swim in alcohol or not?

I'm not sure how they figure out what they should charge, but it's a per head price for the bar, vs. the tab being based on consumption. I've seen fees ranging from $3/head all the way up to $50plus/head, so I don't think there really is a formula to it.

I think what you need to do is talk to your venue and find out what the average drink, let's say, a Bay Breeze would cost? Also, are they charging for soft drinks? I think you can have a host bar/consumption based bar and make it work, without it breaking your bank, but tell the venue to only serve rail liquor. Rail liquor in a mixed drink is better than nothing and if someone wants a Malibu Bay Breeze they will have to get over it.

We opted to go with flat charge per guest for full open bar $16 per person, even though some will not drink still cheaper than $**** for cash bar...

At the venues we looked at that offered flat rates we had top pay per person, regardless of the fact that person might not drink at all. Its simply per head basically.

Another idea is offering an open bar during dinner,or a cocktail hour and then later switch to cash bar at a set time.

Our venue also has run punches available. I think we are going to go this route with a cash bar for other drinks along with a cham toast for everyone. That is unless the magic beverage money fairy pays us a visit!

Lillie D., why did you get heated responses? Just curious because this doesn't seem like a controversial topic to me?

@Sanja- A cash bar is a very controversial topic here. I won't go into details- but it goes against ettiquette of being a good host. In some regions of the country, they are the norm. But in the vast majority of areas- it's a huge NO NO...

And not to call out Lillie specifically- because she is not guilty... But many posters view any suggestion that isn't in agreement with what they want to do as a heated response- even if it's from every single poster and it follows every ettiquette guideline ever in place for any event, ever... Some people just get their panties in a wad when people don't fawn all over their bad ideas/decisions/rule breaking/etc.

@ Meghan, I noticed that, but I'm a newbie, so thanks :-)