FREE 10+ Restaurant Event Planning Checklist Samples in MS Word | Google Docs | Apple Pages | PDF

A restaurant is a great place to hold any event as long as the venue’s capacity permits it. Events such as functions or small conferences, weddings, birthdays, private events, meetings, and many more. But like all events, this would entail months of careful preparation and planning activities. The more complex it is, the more details should be considered to ensure the event’s success. For event planners, they will need to look for a suitable restaurant, menu preparation, guest lists, decorations and etc. With a lot of things to work on, it is important for not only event planners but even if you are personally tasked to arrange the event to have a handy tool such as a restaurant event planning checklist. This will help you remember in detail and organize all the components that will make the restaurant event a complete success. Read more about this in our article below, and should you need any help with your checklist go check out our free restaurant event planning checklist made available on this page.

10+ Restaurant Event Planning Checklist Samples

1. Restaurant Event Planning Checklist

2. Restaurant Event Planning Checklist

3. Sample Restaurant Event Planning Checklist

4. Restaurant Communication Event Planning Checklist

5. Restaurant Function Event Planning Checklist

6. Standard Restaurant Event Planning Checklist

7. Restaurant Client Event Planning Checklist

8. Basic Restaurant Event Planning Checklist

9. Restaurant Food Event Planning Checklist

10. Restaurant Fellowship Event Planning Checklist

11. Restaurant Operation Event Planning Checklist

What Is a Restaurant Event Planning Checklist?

Planning for an event can be exciting as well as stressful. With a lot of things you need to keep in mind, it would be disastrous to forget about one thing. A checklist is a simple tool that anyone could use to remember something or a task they need to accomplish. It is a sort of reminder to help you get the job done. With a restaurant event planning checklist, your restaurant event plans will be made easier as you can methodically go through the list and see to it every aspect of the event planning has been carried out. Also, this checklist isn’t limited to event planners who are tasked to plan out an event in a restaurant setting, even restaurant owners or managers can use a restaurant event planning checklist to host their own restaurant events. Examples of such events are holiday-themed events like Valentines, Christmas, New Year’s Eve countdown, and many others that can help boost the restaurant’s sales. Holding such events is a good marketing strategy for any restaurant business owner.

How To Create a Restaurant Event Planning Checklist?

For some, they prefer celebrating special occasions or holding a meeting in restaurants since there is one less thing to worry about, and that would be the food menu and food servers. As long as they approve of the food, then there would be no need to bring in food elsewhere. If the client insists, then this will be subjected to a corkage fee. So this and other important things must be carefully planned out to make sure that not only everything is accounted for, but right on the budget.

A checklist doesn’t need a proper format, nor can two restaurant event planning checklists be ever the same. It will always depend on how your event plans are mapped out from the theme, guest or customers, the menu, entertainment and etc. The most important thing is that you remember to do all these. So, as you start creating a restaurant event planning checklist, here are several tips that can help you.

1. Basic Event Essentials

Narrow down your list to the basic event essentials that are usually part of every event plan.

• Number of Guests – you will need to make sure you get the number right, secure any invitations and RSVPs to ensure that the food is enough and restaurant property is sufficient to accommodate the guests.
• Date and Time -the time and date must be one of the first few things to finalize since this will affect a number of things, aside from the restaurant’s availability you need to think about the entertainment and make sure that the guests are informed early on so they can make adjustments to their schedules.
• Restaurant – now there are different kinds of restaurants to choose from, but you need an establishment that will fit the event’s theme if they have the right capacity to hold a number of people, the budget and there’s the food menu.
• Decorations – now some clients can be quite meticulous with the decorations, so you need to make it clear when it comes to the theme of the event so it may match with the decorations and all.

2. Event Budget

Part of your checklist is to create a restaurant event budget, make sure you have talked to your client in regards to their budget so you may be able to cover all expenses and not go overboard with the spending. Aside from the obvious expenses, you will need to consider any rentals, expenses incurred from asking quotations from one vendor to another, ocular inspections and etc.

3. Event Program

At some restaurant events, a client would prefer to have a bit of entertainment. This would mean having a whole program that will need a host or DJ, or just a live band playing in the background. Whatever the client needs, you must be able to break down your task such as hiring a host or DJ, looking for a band, perhaps the client would want an official photographer in the event, or for birthday parties maybe they want a magician or clowns and etc.

4. Food Menu

Since the event will be held in a restaurant, all you need to do just to ensure the food is acceptable to the client, ensure that there is enough food and beverages, and nothing should be lacking or if not have a little allowance in case there are additional guests added on the last minute.

5. Marketing Plan

If you are hosting a meeting or a small conference that needs a paid invitation, then you need to consider the marketing aspect of the event. This means sending out flyers, brochures, posting on social media, and other forms of advertising materials. An event checklist will help map the pre-and post-event marketing strategy across all of those channels.

6. Unexpected Costs

As stated, unexpected costs can come when we all least expect them to be. But it is better to anticipate this in advance. For example, there’s the corkage fees, guest that needs transportation, the use of wifi, and other things. Adding this to your checklist can help you estimate the expenses which can help with the event’s budget.

7. Create a Daily Record of Activity

This would be listing down all your pending activities, perhaps a follow-up with your vendors, confirmations, then there’s the billing or invoices that need to be checked, and many others.

8. Post Event

After every event, your work is not quite down yet most especially when it comes to paying off additional costs incurred during the event. See to it that you have the right documentation to make sure you do not miss out on paying your vendors. Also, you need to do other things such as sharing event photos, sending a thank you note, posting on social media, or linking to event materials. The checklist will not only help you manage the tasks but track the results.

FAQs

A restaurant event would be quite hard to organize without the help of a restaurant event planning checklist. With this tool, you are able to analyze all aspects that are needed to ensure that the event will be successful.