Catering Cost Per Head: £8 to £100+ by Style of Service

How much does catering cost per head in the UK?

UK catering typically costs £8 to £15 a head for a cold finger buffet, £15 to £30 for a hot fork buffet or a hog roast with trimmings, and £40 to £100 or more for a plated three-course meal served by staff. Those are ranges from published UK caterer price lists and price guides in 2026, not quotes, and the same menu can cost a third more in London than in the North East.

The number on a quote is food plus labour plus kit plus travel. A buffet dropped on a table at noon is mostly food. A seated dinner for 80 is mostly people: chefs, waiting staff and someone running the room for six hours.

What does each style of catering usually cost?

Cold finger buffet, delivered and left: £8 to £15 a head. Sandwiches, wraps, quiche, sausage rolls, crudités, a sweet item.

Hot fork buffet: £15 to £30 a head. Two or three hot dishes, sides and salads, usually with a member of staff to set up and serve.

Hog roast, BBQ or street food van: £10 to £25 a head, often with a minimum charge that makes small numbers expensive per guest.

Canapés: priced per piece or per head, commonly £5 to £15 a head for a reception round of four to six pieces.

Plated two or three courses: £40 to £100 a head and upwards, before drinks, with staff often itemised separately.

Private chef at home: priced per head for a set menu, commonly well above buffet rates because one person is cooking for a small table.

What pushes the price up?

Staff. Waiting staff are commonly charged at £15 to £30 an hour each, and a chef by the day. A plated meal for 100 might need eight to ten people on the floor.

Guest numbers. Fixed costs (travel, set-up, a chef's day) spread across fewer people, so per-head prices rise sharply below about 40 guests. Most caterers publish a minimum spend for this reason.

Hire. Crockery, cutlery, glassware, linen and chafing dishes are either included or added. Disposable plates are cheaper and look it.

Travel and venue. Mileage beyond a caterer's free radius, parking, a venue kitchen fee, or a venue with no kitchen at all, so everything is cooked off site or on a mobile unit.

Dates. Saturdays in June to September and December are in demand, and pricing reflects it.

What is usually not in the per-head figure?

Read a quote for these, because they are where two quotes that look similar stop being similar: VAT (a caterer under the VAT threshold will not charge it; one over it must), staff hours beyond the agreed time, crockery hire and breakage, delivery and collection, cake cutting, corkage, service charge, and clearing away. Ask for one total price for your date and guest count, including everything, and compare those rather than the per-head headline.

How do you get the price down without it showing?

Cut staff before you cut food. A buffet where guests serve themselves costs less to run than a plated meal, and a family-style sharing platter sits in between. Serve one hot main rather than three. Hold the meal earlier in the day, when a lighter menu feels right. Give the caterer a firm number rather than a range, and ask what they would suggest at your budget: most would rather design something that works at £20 a head than lose the booking.

Where do these figures come from?

The ranges above are drawn from UK caterers' own published price lists and from published UK price guides, read in September 2026. They are a starting point for a conversation with a caterer, not a price anyone on this site has agreed to. Each listing on caterers.trade shows what that business says it does and its food hygiene rating from the council that inspected it; for an actual price, ask them.