Managing Catering Events

The Events feature of the OPERA Sales and Catering program is specifically designed to manage any kind of Catering activity. Events may be as simple as a one-hour reception, or something more complex such as a three-day business meeting with meals, breaks, and specific meeting room, setup, and resource requirements.

Any group function can be entered into OPERA S&C as an event. Events require many levels of organization including: booking a function space for the Event, creating a food and beverage menu, and making sure all other resources needed for the Event are available. All these aspects are handled by the S&C Events module.

Event Management Features

Here are some of the things you can do with events:

Create or change an event. Create events for any group Business Block "from scratch," or use a pre-defined catering package.
Search for an existing event and display detailed information.
Select a function space for the event and specify a set up style.
If the MeetingMatrix interface is installed, display a graphic of the function space and modify the drawing to show the layout for the specific Event.
Select menus for the event.
Select other resource items for the event such as audiovisual equipment, decorations, etc.
Copy an event as a pattern to simplify creating new, similar events.
Move an Event to new dates and times.
Add Notes to an event as reminders or for historical purposes.
Post Banquet Charges.
Print a Banquet Event Order (BEO).
Use the Function Diary — a graphical tool that gives you instant one-stop access to all Event particulars: quickly book events, define dates, specify the type of Event, the function space setup style, and the price.
Use the Waitlist. If a function space is not available for an event, put it on a waitlist.
Use Catering Packages to speed the booking process with inclusive and per-person options.
Handle multi-property Events where the multi-property version of OPERA is installed.
Display a record of all changes for an event using the Event Change Log.
Confidently perform Event Forecasting. Proper management of Catering Events calls for accurate forecasting reports which the Sales Manager can use to monitor the activities of the Sales & Catering team and provide the basis for customer documents like Banquet Event Orders and Catering Contracts. OPERA allows you to generate precise profit and margin figures. OPERA's ability to completely forecast revenue per Event Type and per time period makes this system unique. The ability to allocate costs to menu items and composed menus allows the generation of profit and margin figures for clear and precise analytical data for the Sales & Catering team, including the Chef.
- Event forecast figures can be entered on the configuration level for each event type per revenue type and time period.
- This will automatically create a set of forecast figures as soon as the event type is selected for a newly created event.
- These forecast figures can be manually amended on a per event basis, which allows the sales managers to enter specific figures for events where they know the revenue split will differ from the defaults.
- Event Forecast Reports rely on these figures being present for each event record. If no event forecast figures are entered for any event, these reports will show zero revenue even though actual resources might have been already booked with pricing for the event.
Manage the master and sub-event relationships for multi-level Events. This feature provides streamlined management of related Events. If a group wants to have a second Event that falls at the same time as another Event, then create a sub-event, which inherits the function space, setup, and rate from the master Event. Alternatively, the overbooking feature can handle the same situation, providing the ability to change the function space. A typical event scenario that uses Master and Sub- events as well as sharing restaurant space with other patrons would be the following:
1. A meeting begins at 09:00am and lasts until 05:00pm, Conference Room 1 is booked for this time. This is the Master Event.
2. Coffee and pastries are served, in the same function space, from 10:30am to 10:45am. This is a Sub-event which takes place in the same function space as the Master Event and falls between the time period scheduled for the Master Event.
3. Lunch is arranged to take place in the Brasserie restaurant for this group from 12:00 to 01:30 pm. The restaurant will not be booked exclusively for the group and can have other groups and non-group customers booked into it too. This will be a master event in a shareable function space.
4. Coffee and fruit is going to be served in Conference Room 1 from 03:30 pm to 03:45 pm. This will be a Sub-event again as it takes place in the same room as the Master Event and falls into the total time period the room is booked for the Master Event.
- Sub-events inherit the function space, setup and rate from the Master Event and do not have to have their own meeting space assigned.
- Sub-events must fall in the same start and end times of the master event.
- The system provides the ability to display only Master Events or Master and Sub-events in a grid.
- The system provides a create sub-event function from event screen and from event grid.
- It is not possible to create a sub-event with a status that does deduct from inventory if it is attached to a Master Event that has a status that does not deduct from inventory. However, a Sub-event may have a DEF status attached to a TEN Master Event, assuming that both DEF and TEN deduct from Inventory.
- Sub-events can be converted into Master Events and Master Events into Sub-events through a right mouse click on the grid.
Enable Event overbooking. It is possible to overbook a non- shareable function space with more than one Event at a time if both Events belong to the same Business Block.