The Best Place to Plan Your Birthday Party in Philadelphia

• Minimum Spend

This may also be referred to as “Food and Beverage Minimum”, “Min”, ”Minimum”, “Table Minimum”, “Beverage Minimum”. This is just an amount that you need to spend to reserve a table, section, area of the venue.

• Tax

This is also referred to as “Sales Tax”, “Liquor tax”, “County Tax”. These are the taxes and levies imposed by the state or local municipalities. Many times when you have a table these taxes are passed on to the customer. In order to increase the speed of service at the bar, a lot of places choose to include a tax on orders across the bar. The reason is to eliminate the use of the change when dealing with cash customers.

• Gratuity

This is also referred to as “auto-gratuity”, “server gratuity”, “tip”, “autograt”. Sometimes you have to give the pretty girl making your drinks some money. Gratuity is an important part of the business and no likes a bad tipper. The industry standard is 12%-15% for poor service, 18%-20% average service, 22% or more for exceptional service. Customers that stiff (do not leave gratuity) are customers that have no moral or empathy. That’s like saying you are bad at your job and you should work for free. Tipping 12%-15% gets the point across that you didn’t approve of the service but not leaving a tip or less than 10% just shows that you are a bad tipper. Remember that your server makes $2.83 an hour and they need to give the bartenders and server assistants a portion of their tips each night. In a nightlife setting they typically only get 2-3 tables a night. It’s not like a restaurant where tables turn and if a server gets a bad tip they can recover with from the other tables throughout the night.

• Service Charge

This is also referred to as “admin fee”, “administrative fee”, “processing fee”, ”service fee” “front of house fee”. This nominal charge can range from 3%-8%. The service charge is for the front of house maitre de, host, or hostess.

Know your target audience. If you are planning a birthday party for a someone else, you need to remember that their likes, interests, and tastes my differ from yours. We suggest that you take the role of planning the birthday and putting yourself in their shoes. A birthday is all about making the birthday girl or birthday boy happy. If the birthday girl or the birthday boy like to dance and show off, probably not the best idea to reserve a table at a low key speakeasy. Remember to be aware of your target audience.

If you are planning a birthday party for someone else, you need to remember that their likes, interests, and tastes may differ from yours. We suggest that you take the role of planning the birthday and putting yourself in the shoes of the birthday boy/girl. A birthday is all about making them happy, not you!

If the birthday girl or the birthday boy like to dance and show off, probably not the best idea to reserve a table at a low key speakeasy. Remember to be aware of your target audience.

It’s all about the Benjamins, well sometimes among friends, sometimes it can get down to the Washingtons. If everyone is pitching in equal shares than you know that you are only as strong as your weakest (or should I say cheapest) link.

It may not necessarily be your friend with the least amount of money (they tend to be the most generous), but rather the friend that has the toughest time parting with their funds. Getting everyone to agree can be a tough task but most of the disagreements are about money.

Your fun doesn’t have to be limited by your funds!

If budget is a concern, pick another time besides Saturday night. Everyone has the same idea as you! Saturday night is most venues make the majority of their revenue on Saturday nights. If you are looking for a deal you will get a better response from venues if you choose one of their slower nights.

Fridays are surprisingly a great night for venues to bid for your business. If you have flexibility during the week pick a night that the venue is open but is their slowest night. Even the busiest places have slow nights.

If your event must be private and you are looking to maximize your budget, we recommend hosting your event on an off night. Avoid Saturday night at all cost if you if budget is a concern for you.

Everyone loves a good house party. But what are the reasons guests love them so much? Firstly, it is a cheap night out for the invited guests. The host of the party is informally required to provide something for guests to at least snack upon, baseline alcoholic beverages, mixers, ice, cups, cleaning, entertainment, etc. The majority of the cost, efforts, cleaning, and gratitude fall upon the host.

There some drawbacks that organizers forget the beloved house party is the cleaning and trash that a house party creates. Sometimes the party gets a little out of hand. Personal property can get damaged or sometimes even stolen! Drunk people are known to do some stupid things. And the one thing that organizers always seem to forget that in some states, the organizer of the party can be held accountable if an intoxicated guest gets behind the wheel after leaving the party. For example, New Jersey law allows the victim of a DUI accident to sue and recover damages from the organizer when:

• the organizer provided alcohol to a “visibly intoxicated” guest
• circumstances indicated that serving the guest alcohol created an “unreasonable risk of foreseeable harm”
• the organizer failed to take reasonable measures to prevent the harm caused, and
• the guest got into a car accident and negligently caused property damages or injuries to another person.

Every state has different social host responsibility laws but there a large amount of liability that the organizer is exposed to from the traditional “house party”

Pros:

• Budget Friendly
• Complete control

Cons:

• A lot of work and cleaning
• Damage or loss of personal property
• Liability
• Majority of the expense is on the host

• Restaurants and BYOBs

• Bars

• Nightclubs

True in real life and true in the party life!

Planning ahead is important! All the best options typically book in advance. If you don’t have a good plan then your plan is to fail! Most successful events are booked at least a month in advance. Book early!