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CateringAn Interview with a full-service caterer.This spring, I spoke with Gina Miriam about catering and tips on choosing a caterer for your event.Gina owns a full-service catering company, and, just after this interview, launched a company focused on picnics. By Ellen Zucker EMZ: Tell me about your company. GM: We've been in business for 27 years. We're a full business, off-premises caterer and we do everything from simple drop offs to big events. The most people we ever fed in a day is 3,000. EMZ: Oh, my goodness. GM: And the least is a pan of lasagna if you want that for dinner for your family. So, we actually we do a lot of different kinds of catering. EMZ: So when you say simple drop offs, what do you mean? GM: That means that, let's say, you're hungry one evening, or whatever... Because I've got a restaurant so I can do a lot of things that someone who is just a regular caterer can't do. So let's say you've had a bad day, or something happened and you need to feed your family and you can't get out. You can just call me and tell me "I need a pan of lasagna, I need a pan of salad, I want to feed my family of six". Tell me what time you want it to be there and it would be delivered hot and ready to be eaten. EMZ: Oh, that sounds awesome. GM: Yeah. EMZ: And you when you say that you're full service, what does that mean? GM: Full service means that we come to your location, and we bring not only the food, but we provide the service staff for you... servers, chefs if you need them, bartenders, depending on your needs. EMZ: What kind of parties and events have you served? GM: We've done all kinds of events. Birthday parties, Weddings, Bar Mitzvahs, we've done lots of corporate events. We cook onsite or we cook in our health certified kitchen and bring it to you and set it up. It really depends on what you need. So any kind of event you can imagine. This time of year it's graduations, Communions... that kind of thing. We also do things like shivas, funerals, anniversary parties, reunions, picnics, bar-be-ques, you name it, we do it. EMZ: So you don't necessarily focus on any specific type of event, you cover the gamut. GM: That's right. We do any kind of event you need us to do. We've been doing this for so many years I think we've done avery kind of event you can possibly imagine. They're all fun, actually. EMZ: That's great.I know we spoke of this before we got started, but do you have any kind of geographic focus? GM: Not really. Off premises caterers can go pretty much anywhere and do anything for anybody. I've known some who have traveled three hours or flown to another country to cater different events. I don't have any geographic limits either. EMZ: This is good for visitors to this web site to know. So, how did your company start? GM: We started as a restaurant. And we did a little bit of catering in the beginning. And it's long story, Ellen, but I decided to take myself out of the restaurant and focus on catering. I made my own little company within the restaurant. We still cook from the restaurant unless we're cooking on site in which case I bring out our equipment. Because I can do a whole kitchen at your site and actually cook there. But most of the time, we cook at our own premises. Food is transported in our holding cabinets which keeps food at safe temperatures for hours whether hot or cold. We serve from there. We do plated dinners as well as buffet style. We also do food stations whether chef active or not. Chef active food stations is where there's a chef actually there who prepares your food in front of you. I'm sure you've seen them; carving stations, pasta stations, wok stations, that kind of thing, and... I forgot the original question. I got off on a tangent there... EMZ: No, not really. I was asking how your company evolved. GM: That's right. I started concentrating more on catering and decided to grow that part of the business myself. Just because, this is a family business. The restaurant is a family business. My husband and I own it and it's like a power struggle. "Listen to me." "No, listen to me!" The help gets really confused. So I ended taking myself out of the restaurant and concentrated on the catering part. I like the catering part. It's really interesting. I get to go to different places and meet lots of people. EMZ: That's cool. Now what I want to do is ask general questions about catering. I'm asking them from the perspective of a person who has little experience with event planning and caterers. GM: I deal with a lot of people like that. EMZ: OK, I'm going to start out by being very, very basic. What does a caterer actually do? GM: A caterer can do a lot of different things. It all depends on what you want them to do for you. Different caterers do different things. So you have to wade through them and find the one that is best for you. Basically a caterer provides food for whatever function you need them to provide food for. EMZ: OK, And what kinds of services does a caterer provide that the general public may not know about. GM: Every caterer is different. Some caterers will only provide food-they'll drop it off and leave. Some will provide you with food and service staff which means they'll provide you with servers, bartenders, chefs... Not all of them will provide you with all of these things. They may be limited in what they can provide. Some caterers also consider themselves event planners and I am one of them. EMZ: OK... GM: So if you want to do a whole event, we can put that together for you... tents, tables, chairs, linen china... if you need centerpieces, if you need entertainment such as deejays, if you need entertainers such as a psychic! EMZ: Hey! GM: Exactly, that's what we do. We can put whole events together for you. But it really depends on the caterer. Not all of them do this. EMZ: To what extent do you coordinate with other vendors? What should a client realistically expect a caterer to do and when is it time for the client call in the wedding coordinators, event planners, etc? I know, in your case, you just said that you can do it all-but if you are working with soneone who doesn't-or you want someone else to handle those areas... GM: If a caterer provides that service then they coordinate everything for you and you don't have to do anything else. However if a cater doesn't provide that service and you don't want to do it yourself, that's the time to call in an event planner... someone who can do all of it for you. EMZ: And if that's the case, where in the whole planning process would you contact the caterer? What would you do first? Would you call the caterer first before you did anything? Would you call someone else first? GM: You know what my feeling about that is? People that have a lot of money call the event planner first. The event planner can also take care of getting the caterer for you as well as the entertainment, and everything else you need etc. That's what an event planner, coordinator, whatever you call her does. However, these days, it seems that everybody is getting into everything. It also it depends on the type of event you're planning. If you're planning a wedding, the first thing you want to do is have a date in mindand a place. Once you have those in place, then you call your caterer unless you prefer having an event planner take care all that stuff for you including finding the caterer. You can call the caterer first and see if they can do all of the things you need them to do. EMZ: What information besides the date and location of the event should you have before calling the caterer? Or is that all you need? GM: No, you should know approximately how many people will be attending, how many children out of those people. Depending on the event, you'll want to know the ratio of men to women. Believe it or not, that affects the kind of food you're going to have. EMZ: Really? GM: Uh, huh. You should also know what time of day or evening. EMZ: OK. GM: Because all of this has an effect on what the caterer gives you. GM: Maybe also a basic idea of what you'd like to have. And if not the caterer can help you. EMZ: You mean in terms of menu selection? GM: Yeah, most people who call a caterer have some idea of what they want. Not everybody, but most do. Part of the caterer's job is to offer suggestions... things you may not have thought of, things that may work better for you than what you had thought about doing. EMZ: I was intrigued by your comment where you said the ratio of men to women would affect what you would bring. How so? GM: For example, your doing a bridal shower and you're just having women there... you'll have different kinds of food in different amounts than you would if you were having an event that included both men and women. Men are carnivores. They like to eat meat. Women are not so big on red meat these days. So, these are things that need to be taken into consideration. EMZ: That's interesting. I had never thought about that before. GM: That's because you're not in the business. See, I wouldn't know your business either! EMZ: If you were putting yourself into the client's shoes, how should you go about selecting a caterer? GM: The first thing I would tell them to do is ask their friends for references. EMZ: OK. GM: Because word of mouth... Or if you've been to a party and you've liked the food, find out who the caterer was. That's where I would start. If you don't know anybody and you don;t know where to start, i'd say do what everybody else does these days... Go on the internet and look around and see who's out there. Email and call these people and see who you feel comfortable with. Because a lot of it from a client's level is a comfort level. You have to call and speak to these people-you get the feeling if they seem that know what they're doing, if they are easy or difficult to work with, that kind of thing. And then here are some of the things you should ask the caterer when you get them on the phone. You should ask them if you can taste their food. They may charge you for it. Then they may take it off on the flip side if you book them. But they should let you come and taste their food. You should ask them for references. You should make sure they are legal. A lot of caterers are not legal. By legal I mean they should have a food service permit and work in a health certified kitchen. EMZ: OK. GM: Find out if they have insurance. Find out what their policies are, for example, regarding deposits, leftover food, that kind of thing. And you should ask as many questions as you need to ask to get the answers you need. And the caterer should be happy to give you all the time you need to give you those answers. If the caterer is impatient, move on. Because you want someone that is going to take good care of you. If the caterer is not going to pay attention to you in the beginning then they're not going to pay attention to you at the end. EMZ: That sounds like good advice.How do you know you are dealing with someone who is reputable? GM: You can check them out with the Better Business Bureau, but not everyone is listed there. I'm not. They want you to pay them to be listed. They called me because a lot of people had called them to ask about me. And it's not a small amount of money. I was shocked. I said, "how much do you want a year? You must be out of your mind!" You can call their references, but you don't know who they are giving you... EMZ: Are there associations that caterers commonly belong to? I'm thinking of NACE? Would you consider that an indication of anything? GM" Personally, no, because I don't belong to NACE, I don't find it very helpful for me. I belong to ISES. ISES is more oriented towards event planners... I can't answer your question. That's where word of mouth comes in. EMZ: Can you talk about contracts and pricing. When someone is ready to lock in your services, how do you go about it? GM: OK, this is how I work, and I have to qualify it by saying that every caterer works differently. EMZ: OK. GM: The way I work is... if it's a small catering job, I collect C.O.D. If it's an event that is costly, which to me is an event costing $1,000 or more... I send a contract. And in the contract I spell everything out that they will be getting from me. Everything from rentals, entertainment, food, the whole thing, service staff, all of that stuff would be in the contract. I mail them the contract, they look it over to make sure everything is correct. If it's correct, they send me a third as the deposit. Frankly, I don't care how they pay me the rest as long as I'm paid in full at least 10 days before the event. EMZ: OK, and I assume that you accept cash, checks, credit cards, whatever... GM: That's right. There's even been some cases where the client couldn't even pay me 10 days before the event. I let people slide as much as possible. But they still have to pay me before the event. I had one wedding client who was pulling her hair out trying to get the money together. The day before they paid me cash. That's fine. Even the day before, cash or a valid credit card is fine, but a check is not. EMZ: Right. GM: But, I'm pretty flexible when it comes to payment arrangements-I'm willing to work with the client. EMZ: OK Are there any common client misconceptions-if there was anything you'd like clients to know, is there anything you'd like to tell them? GM: Yes, I would, actually. This is what I have a very difficult time with. When people call me or email me and say "I'm having 150 people, how much will it cost? Without giving me any kind of specific information like we were speaking of at the beginning and you asked what should a client know before calling a caterer. Those things are really important if they want any kind of proper quote. EMZ: Sure. That does make a lot of sense. GM: And I get that a lot. EMZ: Does that happen because a client just doesn't know what to ask? GM: Probably. Of course, a lot of times these people who never used a caterer before and they don't understand. Maybe they've done it themselves before... but times have changed, maybe they've got kids an/or they're holding down a job and they don't have time to cook for a 100 people anymore. They're not home all day anymore. They want to make it easier on themselves. The truth of the matter is, in the end, it's worth it to hire a caterer to take all that responsibility off of you than it is to do it yourself. Because by the time the day of the party comes, you're so tired you can't enjoy it. That's what I hear a lot. And then when the function is over, they call me and tell me, "I'm never going to do this myself again-this is the most wonderful thing! And it really is. Because I've done my own parties, too. Even before I was a caterer. And I know how tired you can get. You're tired before the party starts. By the time the party starts and you just want to go to bed. EMZ: Yeah, you can't enjoy yourself! GM: Exactly. So, it's kind of nice this service is out there for people. EMZ: And then when you're done you just clean up and the client doesn't have to. GM: That's right. If you're having servers there, they clean everything up and they leave the place as spotless as they found it. EMZ: That, alone, is worth half the price of admission. GM It really is. EMZ: OK, I think we've covered a lot of ground. Can you think of anything more you'd like to add? GM: No, I think we covered everything. 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