Crazy insane Smoothie bar prices
Im negotiating with a client right now that wants me to do a smoothie bar for 1500 employees. She says the previous Smoothie caterer charged her 1350.00 (before & tax & grat) to do this last year. My question to the professionals here is does anyone believe that they could serve 1500 smoothies for $1350.00US? Now I dont know what size smoothie he served but having seen him do other events, I believe he usually does a 12oz drink & he was supposed to have served for a 6 hour period. That means he charged her .90 a drink. Is there a smoothie out there that someone could make a profit on by selling a 12oz for .90? I know my smoothie would run me about .95 for a 12oz drink (not including cup & ice) I dont believe the client is trying to lie to me (she might be fudging the numbers a little fishing for a better price) but I wouldnt put it past the other company to have fleeced her. They could have said they would be prepared to serve 1500 while only serving 500 or even just serving little bitty cups, who knows. Oh yeah, she also said he only had 1 bar (and I would guess knowing him, 1 person working that bar) I dont see how he could have served 1500 people out of 1 bar without just having a huge line all day long.
I've catered cappuccino bars & frozen cappuccinos bars for large groups before, Ive done festivals where I've served 1500 people before, I've had plenty of gigs with large groups of people. I just dont see how they could have managed this with 1 bar & only charging 1350.00. Am I totally wrong here?
Mitch
Bella Caffe Fine Coffee & Espresso Catering
Memphis, TN
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Barry Faught on
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They might be using this "previous vendor" as a bargaining chip. I'd tell her to get with the previous vendor to do the job. Sounds like you'll end up losing $$$.
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Permalink Reply by Jared Rutledge on
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yeah something is fishy about that. have you told her everything you just told us? maybe she got ripped off by the other vendor and still doesn't realize it.
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Permalink Reply by Chris on
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Tell her to go with that vendor. Totally.
Tell her that you'll need $2900, and that there is no way that you can get to the $1350 figure without becoming and investor in her company or ripping off and disappointing her clients, and that you have no interest in either. Thank her for her consideration, apologise for taking her time, and ask her to please contact you again when she has a client with a serious budget for quality product.
I tripled my day rate (different field) and lost about two-thirds of my clients.
I started making the same check but with ten times the free time to enjoy it. There are some gigs that you jsut have to take a pass on.
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Permalink Reply by Mitch Buckner - Bella Caffe on
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Oh I dont plan on taking the gig for the 1350 price. If I do it, it will be a higher rate & she'll know that its a higher quality product (and the customers will be taken care of) I got more insight into what the other vendor did last year. They said it was only 900 people & he did 9oz drinks & topped them all with canned whipped topping (yummie). So I assume he probably only put about 6 or 7oz of product in each cup & then filled it up with cheap whipped topping. Plus it was just 1 employee working on 1 blender & they said the lines where horribly long. So I would also guess out of those 900 people 30% of them gave up or just didnt get in line because they would have used their whole lunch break. So I bet they didnt even serve 5 or 600 drinks at only about 6 or 7oz each. They said they are expecting 1000 people this year & would like at least 2 bars to keep the lines down so that alone should make them realize that Im going to have to charge more. Im going to give them a quote & hope they opt for the better quality. From what I gathered, they really dont want to use the other guy anyhow.
Chris said:Tell her to go with that vendor. Totally.
Tell her that you'll need $2900, and that there is no way that you can get to the $1350 figure without becoming and investor in her company or ripping off and disappointing her clients, and that you have no interest in either. Thank her for her consideration, apologise for taking her time, and ask her to please contact you again when she has a client with a serious budget for quality product.
I tripled my day rate (different field) and lost about two-thirds of my clients.
I started making the same check but with ten times the free time to enjoy it. There are some gigs that you jsut have to take a pass on.
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