SC - Cost per Person

[Margo Hablutzel]

Cariadoc and Elizabeth can give more detailed information on how to keep
this low; when we all lived in Grey Gargoyles there was no charge for
feasts.

That's right, NONE.

And this was without people funding it; our group was amazing at doing
fundraising.  We still set a fairly low per-person of about $3.00-3.50 and
had fairly good meals (a couple early ones that leaned too heavily on
veggies-stewed-on-rice or something similar and became somewhat notorious,
but they got better) that were vetted by the fighters so the meat was
sufficient.

You can do this if you plan ahead, buy in bulk, and have greengrocers and
butchers as friends (or seneschals, as His Grace pointed out).  This was, by
the way, in a Kingdom where they regularly had $10.00-12.00 feast tickets.

More recently, I was offered the opportunity to cook for a Kingdom-level
event, and was told by the autocrat that she wanted the feast to come in at
$3.00 per person.  Not asked - told!  I replied that until I confirmed a
menu and checked prices, I could not guarantee that, and for a Kingdom-level
event I was more comfortable with something over $3.00 for a feast ticket.
Generally, I try to come in with the actual cost being 60-80% of the ticket,
to allow for sudden price spikes in crucial ingredients and no-shows.  I
pointed out that with the drought this year, that was having a nasty effect
on produce and until I could price things (buying for one is vastly
different than buying for 500, her projected seating) I refused to commit to
anything under $5.00.

As it happened, someone else was selected, so the exercise was for naught.
(It did lead to period documentation for pretzels, in my wanderings,
however!)  But that is something to consider - how inexpensive do you want
the feast to appear?

I am also one of the people who likes putting the whole menu in the
seneschal's flyer, if not in the newsletter announcements.  If I can, in the
flyer also goes an ingredients list for each dish.  As in:  "Pretzels: wheat
flour, water, salt, yeast."  If I'm trying to prove a point, I list
source/documentation.

This works even better than the price to tell people what will be in the
meal, as some places $5.00 gets you stew, bread, fruit, and cheese, while in
Grey Gargoyles it would get you a four-course meal plus a dessert table
during dancing (if we were to charge for supper, which we did not).

My tuppence on the subject.

	
- ---= Morgan


 ...who is, by the way, appalled at double-digit feast prices no matter how
much I could end up paying for fast-food instead.  I look on feasts as
closer to family cooking, and it does not cost that much to cook meals in MY
family!
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