# Clean up at weddings



## leslieismore (Jan 7, 2014)

Hey everyone

I''m going to start offering catering of weddings and am wondering what is fair to charge for clean up fees. Is it better to charge per person/ per hour or set a standard fee? If there is a wedding of say, 100. What seems right to charge for clean up of dishes?

any suggestions would be helpful!


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## meezenplaz (Jan 31, 2012)

Confused....are you talking about cleaning up your own doings and of china , equipment  etc you have provided?

Or are you talking about offering an extra cleanup service of trash and equipment etc they or someone

else have provided?


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## kaiquekuisine (Apr 11, 2013)

Well i found that a good caterer, or catering company will clean up the mess they make.

Now if you are going to clean up the mess left behind by others , now that is a whole other story.


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## mikeswoods (Jun 14, 2013)

I'm confused--------never heard of separate clean up fees----

We seldom did scullery work on site----all dirty serving ware was sent back to our kitchen for cleaning and wrapping-----the cost was much less to pay our dish washer,using the proper equipment--than to pay serving staff on a job----


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## leslieismore (Jan 7, 2014)

I'll be more in detail. We have a few inquiries for catering held at venues where they already have plates(etc), so we don't need to bring any to them. All of these places, don't have dishwashers so we would have to handwash everything.  For parties of 80 to 100 with glasses, silverware, plates(at least two per person), that's a lot of washing which would probably take a couple hours at least. I would think it would make sense to charge a fee for this but maybe I'm wrong. I've done events where I didn't and it ended up taking a long time so basically just don't want to sell myself short but don't want to scare people away.We won't be cleaning the venues, just the dishware(but could be a lot). It would be server staff and possibly me helping out with that.

Thoughts? Any advice helps!


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## chefross (May 5, 2010)

Your per plate cost should include all the heavy work needed to complete the job.


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## flipflopgirl (Jun 27, 2012)

Who is responsible for the venue contract?

Everything down to the last spoon as well as any cleaning charges should be in it.

If the client wants you to do cleanup bill them no less than what is contracted for.

mimi


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## meezenplaz (Jan 31, 2012)

> Well i found that a good caterer, or catering company will clean up the mess they make.
> 
> Now if you are going to clean up the mess left behind by others , now that is a whole other story.


Kinda what I was getting at KK. /img/vbsmilies/smilies/rolleyes.gif

Agreed, all that cost should be in your per person price, and you can itemize that for the client if needed.

Off the top of my head though, Id say youre gonna want another 2 to three per head to do all that

dishwashing at the venue site. Over and above what you would normally charge without it.

And that's assuming youre using a couple helpers for 100 guestees.


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## mikeswoods (Jun 14, 2013)

Meezenplaz said:


> Kinda what I was getting at KK. /img/vbsmilies/smilies/rolleyes.gif
> 
> Agreed, all that cost should be in your per person price, and you can itemize that for the client if needed.
> 
> ...


I agree---we had a price for service with us providing the serving wares and a much higher price if we needed to use customer provided dishes and such.

I explained the cost was higher because of the expense of paying serving staff to work as dishwashers---honestly--I can only think of a few occasions where we used someone elses equipment----it just costs more .


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