How Much Alcohol Do You Need for a Wedding? (Easy Drink Calculator)

quick answer

1,050 total drinks for 150 moderate drinkers

33 bottles of liquor

14 cases of beer

42 bottles of wine

225–300 lbs of ice

This is with a moderate to heavy drinking crowd.

If you want to learn how I got these numbers or how to change them based on your event, everything will be explained down bellow.

Start with a Drink count

First things first, we need to know how many dinks your serving and what drinks we are actually making. We always want to start with this, as drinks to helps with making an easy grocery list.  Once we know what drinks we are making we can plan everything needed from alcohol to mixers and even ice. To make things simple we can use

Equation

Total Drinks = (Guest Count × 2) + (Guest Count × Hourly Rate × Remaining Hours)

why does it start with guest count x 2?

Most of the guests will try 2 drinks within the cocktail hour and will slow down as we make out way into the reception. People are greeting friends, getting comfortable with everyone and trying the His and Hers drinks at the bar. That first hour is usually the second busy time with the first being about 30 minutes into an open dance floor.

What is an hourly rate?

An hourly rate is how many drinks the crowd will continue to have based on how heavy of a drinker your crowd is.

1 (standard crowd)

1.25 (moderate-heavy crowd)

1.5 (heavy crowd)

Every wedding is different some families are slow sippers and enjoy only 1 or 2 drinks usually while others treat the reception like a full celebration and want cocktails, beers, and the occasional round of shots.

What does this look like in practice?

Guest count: 150

Serving time: 5 hours

Crowd type: Moderate-Heavy

First hour:

150 × 2 = 300 drinks

Remaining 4 hours:

150 × 1.25 × 4 = 750 drinks

Total Drinks =

300 + 750 = 1,050 drinks

Now that we know how many drinks we need we can plan what the drinks are.

example drink menu

Italian Cherry Cola

Ingredients:

1.5oz Tequila

1oz Lime Juice

.5oz Amaretto

.5oz Cherry Juice

Cherry Bitters

Cherry Cola

Fizzy Mango

Ingredients:

2oz mango peppercorn syrup

2oz tequila

Top with club soda

Spicy Margarita

Ingredients:

1oz Jalapeno Syrup

1oz Cointreau

2oz Tequila

Jalapeno Slice

Other: 1 wine + 1  beer

Dividing drinks

Now that we know how many drinks we need and what drinks we’re making, we can divide them between cocktails, beer, wine, and shots.

While every wedding is a little different the common breakdown looks a little something like this:

40% Cocktails

30% Beer

20% Wine

10% Shots

Math time

This is where calculations become a lot but don't worry we are going to try and break it down as easy as possible. Lets see how many drinks fall into each category.

Cocktails

1050 x .40 = 420

Beer

1050 x .30 = 315

Wine

1050 x .20 = 210

Shots

1050 x .10 = 105

Since we have 3 signature drinks lets split the cocktails evenly.

420 / 3 = 140 of each cocktail

We are almost done! Now lets convert all this into bottles and ingredients.

For the Italian Cherry Cola we are doing 1.5oz of tequila

140 drinks x 1.5 = 210 oz

One handle is 750 ml per bottle which equals roughly 25 oz

210 / 25 = 8.4 bottles

We now round up to 9 bottles of tequila needed

Using this same process we get

140 oz of lime juice =1.2 gallons

70 oz of Amaretto=3 bottles

70 oz of cherry juice

8 two litter bottles of cherry cola

For the Fizzy mango we are doing 2oz of tequila

140 drinks x 2= 280 oz

Again one handle is 750 ml per bottle which equals roughly 25 oz

210 / 25 = 11.2 bottles

We now round up to 12 bottles of tequila needed

We also get 280 oz of Mango peppercorn syrup = 2.3 gallons

Club Soda came out to about 10 two liters but lets round up just to be safe for 12 two liters

The spicy margarita is the same amount of tequila so that's another 12 bottles for just that drink

The jalapeno syrup is 140 oz or 1.1 gallons

The amount of Cointreau needed is 140 oz equaling about 6 or 7 bottles

A standard case of beer is a 24 pack and with 315 beers calculated we will need 14 cases.

Each wine bottle serves about 5 glasses per bottle with 210 glasses calculated that gives us 42 bottles .

Last of our alcohol is shots 105 shots is 157.5 oz of alcohol

157.5 / 25oz a bottle = about 6 or 7 bottles for shots

Finally we calculate ice. Ice is one of the most important parts of any event bar, and it’s something people often underestimate. My rule is simple: always order extra.

In the winter we do guest count x 1.5 lbs of ice

In the summer its x 2

150 x 1.5 = 225 pounds of ice if its a cold winter wedding

150 x 2 = 300 pounds of ice in the summer

Ice is not something you want to mess around with . I will always recommend more ice than is needed so we don't risk running out halfway throughout the event.

With no ice there is no cocktails, no cold beers, no fresh garnishes being chilled and warm wine that will explode as we try and open them.

The grocery list

Alcohol

Tequila

33 bottles

Cointreau

6 bottles

Shot liquor

7 bottles

Beer

14 cases

Wine

42 bottles

Mixers

Lime juice

1 gallon

Cherry Juice

1/2 gallon

Cherry cola

7-8 two liters

Club soda

10-12 two liters

Homemade ingredients

Mango peppercorn syrup

2+ gallons

Jalapeno syrup

1+ gallon

Ice

Winter

225 lbs

Summer

300 lbs

Planning a Wedding Bar in the Central Valley?

If you're planning a wedding in the Central Valley and want help designing a cocktail menu, calculating alcohol, or creating custom drinks for your event, that’s exactly what we do at The Garnished Glass.

From signature cocktails to handcrafted syrups and curated drink menus, our goal is to make the bar one of the most memorable parts of your celebration.

You can explore our services or request a consultation here: