Oxford BF pricing

Also bear in mind that given wastage, overmeasure, staff beer etc you are unlikely to get more than 120 saleable pints for each 144 pint kil.

Also it makes sense to budget for break-even at around 75% or 80% of beer sold. You can't guarantee you will sell out, and if you don't you will have a major financial hole.

In message , The Submarine Captain wrote

Most plastic glasses from the likes of Tesco are not marked with pint/half lines? Some form of other measured dispense would be required.

In message , Christine wrote

I bet most festivals do have staffing costs. Free, or cheap beer for instance. There is also cost of training, insurance for staff (and customers) and out of pocket expenses. While these costs may fall far short of the minimum hourly wage they may not be insignificant especially if in the future local councils may require that some of the staff have hygiene, first aid or door staff training/certification.

Done properly it can be. That's why people hang on to the expertise developed over the course of a few decades.

Voluntary organisation, look at the exemptions list.

gavin a écrit :

Indeed, such venues are excluded, in principle.

In that case one obviously wouldn't need to carry the beer :-)

AIUI, a venue can impose its own conditions above what the law requires including use of selected accredited security operators. In such cases costs will almost certainly fall on the venue hirer.

An exemption applies only if the venue owner wishes it to be applied.

John B

Also I have not heard any talk of drinks (and maybe food) for the people staffing the festival. This is added cost which no-one has factored in.

I ran 2 beer festivals during college (in winter '95 and '96) with some believing they were to be a money making exercise. The previous year had made money after they raised the prices on the year before, but I put them down again since I didn't see any reason to do much more than break even...

Loose Summary of Costs: Glasses (printed) approx 1.50 a pop, for an expected attendance of maybe

University catering ran the food end, so no money to be made there. Potato and rice based things are nearly free and can be sold reasonably at a good profit with volunteer staff.

So, we have 3150 pints to sell, costing 3750 plus incidentals of 300 (=1.23/pint), plus VAT, which we basically pay only on the difference between the purchase and sale price, as I understood it.

Assuming you sell everything (and that's a big if...)

I stayed away from the finances of the thing, and so I've never known how much money was made or lost. In fact, on the day itself, I collared my co-organiser who'd barely lifted a finger all the previous weeks, told him he was in charge for the day, and I spent the day drinking with a young lady I'd seen around college and had made it clear to her that this was an event not to be missed. She clearly enjoyed the attention (and I guess the free beer couldn't have done any harm), so I ended up leaving with her, and marrying her 7 years later!

The mention of the festival on my CV then got me my first job, so there's much to be had out of this running a festival game.

Cheers for that - bit more informative than some of the rest :o)

I've just checked back and I didn't say what I frequently say - work at a CAMRA beer festival and you will find out what can and can't be done to make money. The point is that simply telling people things doesn't work, they forget bits and so do the people doing the telling. Work there and you have all day (over several days of the lead up and then the open sessions) to find things out. It can be incredibly simple if you know and have the knowledge well ingrained (to the point of being habit) but it is also incredibly simple to go wrong.

From memory ; 50 firkins beer/cider inc VAT came to just under £3000 (we actually found it cheaper than 2004 because our cellarman really knows his way about and seems to get ales/ciders at silly prices) Accommodation costs nil We were able to comfortably sell all at £2 a pint,even the Sarah Hughes Rich Dark Ruby went out at a profit. There was perhaps 9 gallons left unsold altogether.