Should You Tip Your Caterer?
When you hire a catering company to cater your wedding reception, family holiday gathering, corporate lunch, or other special events, you want the best food at the most reasonable prices. That’s exactly what Chef Raymone provides. But do we expect you to tip us or any of our employees? No, we don’t expect tips, but we and they always appreciate them.
As a reputable and ethical catering company, Chef Raymone will always tell you up-front if and when we add a gratuity to your bill. That’s part of the catering services we provide. This allows you to take tipping into consideration as you determine your catering costs. Remember, however, that the service charge you see on our bill does not represent a gratuity. Rather, it represents our way of covering whatever incidental expenses may come up in our servicing of your event.
What Tips Represent
Tips have become the American way of saying “thank you” to servers and other people who provide you with personal service at restaurants, bars, hotels, etc. In many cases, tips represent a large portion of the money these people earn. In some cases, they work for tips alone. Either way, tips are important to those who receive them.
When considering whether or not to tip your caterer, think about the size of your event and how long it will last. A simple 10-person office luncheon where you only need us to drop off the food is considerably different than a multi-hour wedding reception for 200 people. Other considerations might include the following:
- How much time and skill did it take to prepare the food?
- How much time and skill did it take to decorate your venue?
- How much time did it take to set up the buffet line or individual place settings?
- How many people did each server or bartender serve?
- How much oversight was your event manager required to do and for how long?
Catering requires fast work that can sometimes prove exhausting for the catering staff. If you find one or more of our Chef Raymone servers. bartenders, or kitchen staff to be especially helpful and/or personable, feel free to express your gratitude by giving him or her a tip. You certainly will not offend him or her. In fact, (s)he will greatly appreciate your thoughtfulness.
Chef Ramone prides itself on being a top-notch catering company. As such, we’re committed to providing you with not only the delicious, high-quality food you want but also the most experienced and skilled people to prepare it and the most personable people to serve it. Our goal is to make your event one you and your guests will remember with pleasure and smilingly talk about for years to come.
Common Tipping Practices
Should you choose to tip us or our employees, you may wish to consider giving the following amounts to the following people:
- Between $50 and $100 to the chef
- Between $50 and $100 to the event manager
- Between $25 and $50 to each server
- Between $25 and $50 to each bartender
- Between $25 and $50 to each kitchen staff member
As an alternative, you can tip our company 15% to 20% of your overall bill and we’ll distribute that money among our employees who worked at your event.
At Chef Raymone, all of our staff and employees are dedicated to being the best we can be so your event will be the best and most memorable it can be. We’re here to serve you, and promise to do so diligently and happily, whether or not you tip us. As we said earlier, none of us expect you to tip us, but we always appreciate it when you do.
