A catering enquiry form that gets the headcount first time

A party of 40 wants your private dining room for a 60th birthday. The first email asks if you're free "sometime in March". The next five work out the date, the time, the headcount, the budget and the fact that six guests are vegetarian and one has a nut allergy.

By the ninth email you have a booking, and somebody on your team has spent most of an afternoon on it.

Private dining and catering are some of the best-margin work a restaurant does. The enquiry process is often the worst-run part of it.

Why catering enquiries turn into email chains

Most enquiries arrive through a contact form, an Instagram message or a phone call that ends with "send me an email". None of those ask the right questions in the right order, so the details arrive one reply at a time.

The questions are always the same. Date and time, number of guests, budget per head, type of event, dietary requirements, drinks, and whether they need the room exclusively. When any of them is missing, the quote waits.

A catering enquiry form works when it asks for everything you need to quote before the first reply. The form doesn't replace the conversation. It makes sure the conversation starts at the menu, not at the date.

What to ask on a catering enquiry form

Keep it to what you genuinely need to price the event:

• Event date and preferred start time
• Number of guests, and how firm that number is
• Type of event (birthday, wedding reception, corporate dinner, wake)
• Budget per head, or a total budget
• Dietary requirements and allergies
• Drinks: package, bar tab or pay as you go
• Name, phone number and the best time to call

Anything else, such as table plans or music, can wait until the booking is confirmed.

Building the form without a form builder

With TinyX you write the questions in plain markdown and share the form as a short link. Put that link on your website's private dining page, in your Instagram bio and in your email signature, or print its QR code on a card for people who ask at the bar.

Guests fill it in without creating an account, and every answer lands in your dashboard and exports to CSV. If you run a seasonal offer, such as Christmas party bookings, you can cap the number of responses so the form stops accepting enquiries once you're full.

The Free plan includes five questionnaires, which is plenty for one enquiry form and a restaurant feedback form besides. Pro and Max raise the limit, as shown on the pricing page.

Sending the menu and quote back

Once you have the details, the reply is usually a PDF: the set menu, the price per head and your terms. Attachments get buried, forwarded and found again six months later at the old price.

Instead, upload the quote to TinyX and send a link. Set a password if it includes deposit or payment details, and set the link to expire on the date the quote does. When it expires, the file is deleted and the link stops working, so nobody books next year's party at this year's price. We wrote more about why that matters in your share link from 2021 still works.

Where a form stops and you start

A form gathers facts. It doesn't sell the room, take a deposit or check the diary for you. TinyX doesn't manage bookings or take payments, so you will still confirm the date in your reservations system and handle the deposit as you do now.

What changes is the first reply. Instead of "what date were you thinking?", it can be a proposed menu and a price.

Questions about catering enquiry forms

Do customers need an account to fill in the form? No. They open the link or scan the code and answer in their browser.

Can I stop the form taking enquiries when I'm fully booked? Yes. You can cap the number of responses, and you can switch the link off at any time.

Can I password-protect the quote I send back? Yes, with a password and an expiry date.

Set it up before the Christmas enquiries start

Write the seven questions above into a TinyX questionnaire, add the link to your private dining page and see how many emails the next enquiry takes. For more on how restaurants use TinyX, see TinyX for restaurants.