What it costs to put a coffee bar at your event
The price of a coffee bar at an event comes from five things: how many people, how many hours, how far we drive, whether the menu is milk-heavy, and whether you want it branded. Everything below explains how each of those moves the number, and what is in the price before anything is added.
Almost nobody in this region publishes a price. We think that is a way of making you spend a phone call to find out whether you can afford something — so here is ours, along with the parts that are genuinely impossible to fix in advance and why.
Most days are one of these
The setup that arrives is the same every time. What changes is how long it is open and how much has to be built around it.
Our rates are not on this page yet. That is a gap we are closing, not a policy. Ask for your date and you get the actual figure by email, with the breakdown — no bracket, no meeting required first.
One service window
On request figure sent the same day you ask
One stretch of the day: after the ceremony, at the finish line, the mid-morning break at an offsite.
- One place, one continuous service
- Setup before, pack-down after
- Espresso menu, milk done properly
The whole day
On request scaled to hours and headcount
Open across the day, in pushes: the morning, the lull after lunch, the slump at midnight. The most common booking for a wedding.
- Service across the day rather than one window
- Menu that shifts with the hour
- Quiet stretches used to reset, not to leave
Bespoke
Quoted per project
Several days, several locations, or a build that has to carry someone else's brand.
- Multi-day and multi-stop activations
- Branded cups and a custom menu
- Awkward access, early starts, remote sites
A quote is one page. It names the hours, the place, the travel, the menu and the total — and nothing appears on the invoice that was not on it.
Five things, and only five
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How many people
Not every guest drinks coffee, and they do not all arrive at once. What matters is the peak — how many want a cup in the same twenty minutes — because that decides whether one bar can hold the queue.
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How many hours
Service time is the largest single component. A two-hour window and a ten-hour day are different jobs, not the same job for longer.
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How far we drive
Distance from base, and whether the day starts early enough to need a night nearby. This is the part most suppliers hide until the invoice; ours is a line on the quote.
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Milk or black
A flat white takes several times longer to make than an espresso. A milk-heavy menu at a large event is the difference between one bar coping and one bar not.
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Whether it carries your brand
Printed cups, a menu written in your words, artwork on the vehicle. Quoted separately so the base price is not inflated for everyone who does not need it.
In the price, always
- The vehicle and the full espresso bar built into it
- Someone behind it who can actually make the coffee
- Specialty beans, ground on site
- Milk, and the alternatives people ask for
- Cups and everything served with them
- Our own power and water — nothing plugged into the venue
- Setup before the first guest and pack-down after the last
- The place left exactly as we found it
Extra, and said out loud
- Travel beyond the included distance
- Hours added beyond the booked window
- Printed cups, custom menus, artwork
- A second position on the site, if the day needs one
- Overnight logistics for a start before dawn
- Anything we do not own and have to hire in for you
None of these appear as a surprise. If we think a day will need one, it is on the quote before you agree to anything.
Travel
Tell us where the day happens and we will tell you whether travel is included or added. Either way it is written on the quote before you book, never afterwards.
Minimums
There is a minimum, because the drive, the setup and the pack-down are the same work whether there are thirty people or a hundred. Ask and we will tell you what it is for your date.
Deposit and cancellation
A date is held with a deposit, and the balance is due around the event. The deposit amount and the cancellation terms are written on the quote you sign — not in small print, not on a page you have to go looking for.
Three answers is enough for a quote
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The date and the place
Even approximately. It tells us the drive and whether we are free.
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Roughly how many people
A range is fine. Nobody has a final headcount early, and we do not need one.
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When you want coffee happening
One window or across the day. That is the last thing the price depends on.
Tell us about the day
Date, place, roughly how many people. We answer with a real price, not a form letter.