Creating a catering event and giving it a food offering

Where do I create a new event?

Under Offer → Events, with the «New event» button. The event starts in the «Lead» status and its card opens for you to fill in. The event list shows you «Events this month», «Forecast revenue», «Average margin» and «Pending payments» along the top, and you can search by name, client or venue.

What does the event card ask for?

Under «Event details» you fill in the Event name, the Event type (Wedding, Corporate, Birthday, Cocktail, Communion, Other), the Service style (Plated, Buffet, Cocktail, Family style, Food truck), the Date and the Start and End times.

Under «Venue» go the Space, the Address and the Distance (km) — that distance is what feeds the per-km transport lines in your logistics. Under «Guests» you have three numbers: Minimum, Expected and Guaranteed. And under Client you pick one from your book or create one on the fly with «New client», along with their Contact and the Deposit.

How do I give an event its food offering?

In the «Food offering» section press «Choose offering» and pick a set menu, a buffet or an à la carte menu you’ve already created. The offering works as a template and the event’s cost scales with its guest count: a set menu is multiplied by the pax, and a buffet applies its template cost per guest to the event’s pax.

Two on-screen warnings that are worth taking seriously:

• «A menu card has no per-guest cost: the event will have no food cost.» — to quote a catering job, pick a set menu or a buffet.
• «The chosen buffet has no template guests: it cannot be scaled.» — open the buffet and give it its pax before assigning it.

If the buffet carries overproduction, the event’s food cost already includes it and labels it as a batch cushion.

How does Miselup work out the event’s price?

In the «Event cost sheet» side panel, Food, Logistics and Overhead add up to the Total cost, and below that comes the Cost / billed guest: it divides by the guaranteed guests or, if you haven’t set those yet, by the expected ones (in which case it’s labelled as estimated). Overhead is a percentage added on top of the food-plus-logistics subtotal to cover structure.

To set a price:

1. Type your «Target margin» as a percentage.
2. Press «Suggest»: Miselup works out price = cost / (1 − margin/100).
3. Adjust the «Quoted price» if you want and press «Save quote».
4. Check the «Price / guest», the «Real margin» and the «Food cost».

If you change ingredients or offerings later, use «Recompute» to refresh the event’s cost.

How do I keep a copy of what I sent the client?

Under «Quote versions», with the «Save current version» button: it leaves a snapshot with the price, the guest count and the conditions of that offer. Each version can be flagged as «Sent» and «Accepted», with its date. For the document, the card has «Print quote» and «Print BEO» (the service order, with its BEO no.).

What happens when I confirm the event?

An event’s statuses are Lead → Quoted → Confirmed → Served → Invoiced, plus Lost and Cancelled. To be able to confirm, Miselup requires three things: guaranteed guests, a food offering, and that offering having a computable cost.

On confirmation, the price is frozen as the contract and stops being recalculated even if your offerings or your costs change; the offering and the logistics are locked too. From then on you can record the Actual vs budget figures (actual pax, actual revenue, actual food and actual logistics) and compare budget against reality item by item.

Known limits

• An à la carte menu brings no per-guest cost to an event: use a set menu or a buffet.
• A buffet with no template guests can’t be scaled onto the event.
• With no guests defined there’s no cost per guest to work out.
• Once confirmed, the offering and the logistics are locked on the event and the contractual price is frozen.
• The quote Miselup prints is a working document with no fiscal value: the invoice is issued by your invoicing system.
• To see what each plan includes, check Miselup’s plans.