How much alcohol per guest: wedding and corporate event calculator
Plan 2 drinks per drinking guest in the first hour and roughly 1 drink for every hour after that: a 5-hour event comes to about 6 drinks per guest. Then split the drinks by category, convert them to bottles and add a 10–15% buffer. Below is the formula, ready-made category splits and two worked examples for 50 and 100 guests, the way we calculate it for a mobile bar.
What is the basic formula for drinks per guest?
The formula is drinks = drinking guests × (2 + hours − 1). Guests drink faster in the first hour — welcome drink, greetings, toasts — so that hour gets 2 drinks. After that the pace settles to about one drink an hour.
One drink means:
- a 150 ml glass of wine;
- a 125 ml flute of sparkling;
- a 0.5 l beer (or a 0.33 l bottle if guests drink from bottles);
- 40 ml of spirits, neat, with a mixer or in a cocktail.
Adjust straight away for:
- Drinkers only. Children, drivers, pregnant guests and non-drinkers are usually 10–20% of the list. If the couple is not sure, take off 10%.
- Wedding vs corporate. At a wedding with dancing until late, the pace after hour three often stays at 1–1.5 drinks an hour. At a weekday corporate event where half the room leaves by 10 pm, 1 drink an hour after the first is more honest, and guest drop-off counts.
- Season and format. Outdoors in summer, beer, sparkling and long drinks go up; in winter, wine and spirits. A standing reception drinks faster than a seated dinner.
How should I split drinks by category?
The split depends on the crowd, but these shares are a sound starting point. Confirm them in the client brief: one question — "what do your guests usually drink?" — saves half the cases.
| Category | Wedding | Corporate |
|---|---|---|
| Wine (red + white) | 40–45% | 30% |
| Sparkling | 15% | 10% |
| Beer | 15% | 30% |
| Spirits and cocktails | 25–30% | 30% |
At weddings, red and white are usually split about half and half; in summer, white and rosé take 60%. If there is a sparkling toast for everyone, make sure there is at least one flute per guest on top of the welcome drink.
How many drinks are in a bottle?
Convert drinks to bottles with fixed ratios:
| Container | Serves |
|---|---|
| Wine 0.75 l (150 ml glass) | 5 |
| Sparkling 0.75 l (125 ml flute) | 6 |
| Spirits 0.7 l (40 ml) | 17 |
| Spirits 1 l (40 ml) | 25 |
| Beer keg 30 l (0.5 l) | 60 |
| Beer keg 50 l (0.5 l) | 100 |
If a cocktail contains 50–60 ml of alcohol (two base spirits, for example), count it as 1.5 drinks.
Worked example: wedding, 100 guests, 5 hours
100 adult drinking guests for 5 hours: 100 × (2 + 4) = 600 drinks.
| Category | Share | Drinks | Bottles / volume | With ~10% buffer |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wine | 45% | 270 | 54 bottles | 60 bottles |
| Sparkling | 15% | 90 | 15 bottles | 17–18 bottles |
| Beer | 15% | 90 | 45 l | one 50 l keg |
| Spirits and cocktails | 25% | 150 | 6 l ≈ 9 × 0.7 l | 10 bottles |
Split the spirits by what the guests drink. At a typical Latvian wedding that means vodka, whisky, rum for cocktails and gin for G&Ts; with 10 bottles, something like 3 vodka, 3 whisky, 2 gin and 2 rum.
Worked example: corporate event, 50 guests, 5 hours
50 guests × 6 drinks = 300 drinks. If a third of the room usually leaves after hour three, you can bring this down to 260–270, but keep 300 for the first estimate.
| Category | Share | Drinks | Bottles / volume | With ~10% buffer |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Beer | 30% | 90 | 45 l | one 50 l keg |
| Wine | 30% | 90 | 18 bottles | 20 bottles |
| Sparkling | 10% | 30 | 5 bottles | 6 bottles |
| Spirits and cocktails | 30% | 90 | 3.6 l ≈ 5–6 × 0.7 l | 6–7 bottles |
How big a buffer, and how do I avoid leftovers?
Add 10–15% on top of the calculation, and up to 20% on whatever runs out first at this type of event. Wine running out at 11 pm is remembered longer than any cocktail.
To stop the buffer from turning into waste:
- Agree a return of unopened bottles with your supplier before the event. If you charge on consumption, returning unopened stock is standard (more in our guide to bar payment models).
- Never open a new bottle until the current one is finished. The bartender keeps no more than 1–2 open bottles of each product.
- Store the buffer separately — in cases behind the bar or in the back room, not on the working counter.
- Reconcile at the end of the night: how much went out, how much was opened, how much came back. Those numbers are your best input for the next estimate.
Do not forget soft drinks: water, juice, soda and lemonade, 1–1.5 l per guest over 5 hours, more in summer. Mixers for spirits: about 150 ml per mixed drink. Ice and glassware are calculated separately — see how much ice and glassware you need.
Calculation checklist
- Number of drinking guests (minus children, drivers, non-drinkers).
- Hours the bar is open, not the length of the whole event.
- Format: seated dinner, standing reception, party; season; indoors or outdoors.
- Category shares agreed with the client.
- Bottle conversion using the ratios above.
- 10–15% buffer and an agreed return of unopened stock.
- Soft drinks, mixers, ice.
How this works in Garnify
In Garnify, the bottle list for each event becomes a warehouse pick list: the team sees what leaves for the event and, afterwards, what came back. Bartenders get their shift through a Telegram bot and know what is on the bar in advance, without a separate spreadsheet in the group chat.
Questions and answers
How much alcohol do I need per guest at a wedding?
For a 5-hour wedding, plan about 6 drinks per drinking guest: 2 in the first hour and 1 per hour after. For 100 guests that is roughly 55–60 bottles of wine, 15–18 bottles of sparkling, 45 litres of beer and 9–10 bottles of spirits (0.7 l).
How many glasses of wine are in a bottle?
A 750 ml bottle gives 5 glasses of 150 ml, or 6 flutes of sparkling at 125 ml. For planning, count wine at 5 serves per bottle and sparkling at 6.
What happens to leftover alcohol?
Agree a return of unopened bottles with your supplier or the client before the event, and never open a new bottle until the current one is empty. That way a 10–15% buffer costs almost nothing, because unopened stock goes back.
All of this on one event card
Garnify keeps the enquiry, quote, team and inventory in one place. Free for 2 months.