Guide and examplesWhat is a banquet event order (BEO)?
What goes on one, how to write one the kitchen can actually cook from, and two filled-in examples: a corporate dinner and a wedding. To write your own, fill in the free BEO template.
By the MyVenueHQ team. Updated .
A banquet event order (BEO) is the document every team at a venue works from for one event. It lists the timeline, guest count, menu and dietary counts, bar, room setup, staffing and special requests, and the client approves it before the day.
What a BEO is for
The contract says what the client bought; the BEO tells your staff how to deliver it. The chef reads the counts, the bar reads last call, the setup crew reads the floorplan, and the captain runs the night off the timeline. No floorplan yet? The free floor plan maker draws one to scale and downloads it as an image.
It works because there’s only one. When the guarantee moves from 118 to 120 it changes in one place, and nobody sets 11 tables from an old email while the kitchen plates for 120.
What goes on a BEO
Eleven parts. Small venues merge a few, but each one answers a question somebody will ask at 5 pm on the day.
| Part | What to put in it |
|---|---|
| Event details | Name, date, room, start and end times, and a version number so staff know they hold the latest copy. |
| On-site contact | The one person staff call when something needs a decision. Often the planner, not the client. |
| Guest count | Expected and guaranteed, plus the date the guarantee is due. The kitchen cooks to it; the invoice bills to it. |
| Timeline | Every moment staff act on, each with a time. |
| Menu and dietary counts | Courses, service style, how many of each entrée, and every allergy as a number. |
| Bar | Hosted, cash or on consumption; what’s poured, where the bars are, the toast and last call. |
| Room setup | Tables, seats per table, linens, dance floor and stage, with a floorplan that matches. |
| AV and equipment | Microphones, screens, lighting and power, who supplies each, and when it’s tested. |
| Staffing | Roles, counts and call times. |
| Special requests | Vendor arrivals and meals, decor, accessibility, anything that fits nowhere else. |
| Billing and approval | Priced lines, deposit, balance, and signature lines for the client and the venue. Plenty of venues leave the prices off the kitchen copy. |
BEO example: a wedding, filled in
A complete BEO for a sample wedding at a sample venue; the corporate dinner at the top of the page is the other example. Print this page and only this one prints. The numbers reconcile, which is the point: 98 short rib plus 22 risotto is 120, and so is 11 rounds of 10 plus a head table of 10.
Banquet event order
Grandview Hall · BEO 1042, version 3
Issued October 10 · Approved by client
Event details
- Event
- Whitfield and Nakamura wedding
- Date
- Saturday, October 17
- Room
- Garden Room and garden lawn
- Times
- 3:00 pm to 11:00 pm
- Guests
- 120 expected, 120 guaranteed
- Guarantee due
- October 3
Client and on-site contact
- Client
- Amelia Whitfield
- On-site contact
- The couple’s planner, name and mobile
- Venue lead
- Event manager on duty
Timeline
| Time | What happens | Where |
|---|---|---|
| 1:00 pm | Vendors arrive, setup begins | Garden Room |
| 3:00 pm | Doors open to guests | Garden lawn |
| 4:00 pm | Ceremony | Garden lawn |
| 4:45 pm | Cocktails and canapés | Terrace |
| 6:30 pm | Dinner service | Garden Room |
| 8:15 pm | Cake and speeches | Garden Room |
| 8:45 pm | First dance, dancing | Dance floor |
| 10:30 pm | Last call | Both bars |
| 11:00 pm | Event ends |
Menu · plated, three courses
| Course | Dish | Count |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | Burrata, heirloom tomato | 120 |
| Main | Braised short rib | 98 |
| Main | Wild mushroom risotto (vegetarian) | 22 |
| Dessert | Olive oil cake | 120 |
Dietary: vegetarian 6, gluten free 5, nut free 2, dairy free 1. Seat cards mark each one.
Bar and beverages
- Bar
- Main bar and terrace bar, two bartenders
- Service
- Beer, wine and signature cocktail
- Toast
- Sparkling wine, 120 pours at 8:15 pm
- Last call
- 10:30 pm
Room setup
11 rounds of 10 and a head table of 10, for 120 seats. Ivory floor-length linens. 20 by 20 foot dance floor in front of the head table, DJ booth beside it, cake table by the terrace doors. Floorplan attached.
Staffing
| Role | Count | Call time |
|---|---|---|
| Event captain | 1 | 12:30 pm |
| Servers | 10 | 2:30 pm |
| Bartenders | 2 | 3:30 pm |
| Setup and turn crew | 4 | 12:30 pm |
Special requests
Three vendor meals (photographer, DJ, planner) at 6:45 pm. Nut allergy at table 4. Couple’s own cake knife is with the planner.
Billing summary
| Garden Room, evening hire | $2,400.00 |
| Dinner package, three courses, 120 at $52 | $6,240.00 |
| Bar setup and two bartenders | $960.00 |
| Total | $9,600.00 |
|---|---|
| Deposit received | $2,400.00 |
| Balance due October 3 | $7,200.00 |
Client approval and date
Event manager and date
Sample venue, couple and figures.
How to write a BEO
- Open the signed contract and the accepted proposal. The BEO says how you’ll deliver what was sold, so it can’t contradict either.
- Fill in the event details and the on-site contact before anything else.
- Write the timeline in the order staff will live it, and check dinner can’t start before the room flip is done.
- Add the menu with counts. Entrées should add up to the guest count exactly.
- Describe the room and attach a floorplan whose seats match that same count, then set the bar and staffing.
- Send it to the client to approve. Once they do, number the version and send it to every department.
When the guarantee lands, change the count, the entrée split, the table count and the floorplan together. Those drifting apart is how most BEOs go wrong. Our guest count change checklist walks through all four. To write your own, fill in the free BEO template and download it as a Word file.
BEO vs contract vs run of show
| Document | What it settles | Who reads it |
|---|---|---|
| Contract | Price, date, deposit, cancellation terms. Signed before the deposit. Twelve clauses to include. | Client, venue sales |
| BEO | How the event runs: counts, menu, bar, setup, staffing, timeline. Approved once details are final. | Kitchen, bar, setup crew, captain, client |
| Run of show | The timeline only, minute by minute. Wedding run of show template, or build a wedding day timeline first with the timeline generator. | Captain, planner, DJ, photographer |
BEO terms and abbreviations
The shorthand printed on hotel and venue BEOs, and what each one means for the people working from it.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| EXP and GTD | Expected and guaranteed guest count. The kitchen cooks to the guarantee, and the client pays for at least that many. |
| Set | How many places the crew actually lays. Often a few above the guarantee. |
| Overset | The extra places above the guarantee, so a late guest has a seat. Your policy sets how many. |
| ++ (plus plus) | The price is before service charge and tax. A $100++ menu costs more than $100 a head once both are added. |
| EO | Event order. What Marriott and some other hotels call the BEO. |
| F&B | Food and beverage: the menu, the bar and anything else catering serves. |
| A/V | Audiovisual: microphones, projectors, screens and sound. |
| ROS | Run of show, the minute by minute schedule. On a small event it’s the BEO timeline; on a big one it’s its own document. |
| Resume | A summary of a whole group’s program across days and rooms. Each function on it gets its own BEO. |
| Version or revision | The number that tells staff which copy is current. Anything printed with a lower number goes in the bin. |
Four mistakes that cost you on the night
Counts that don’t add up. If the entrées total 118 on a BEO guaranteed at 120, the kitchen cooks 118.
A floorplan from an older version. The BEO says 12 rounds, the drawing shows 11, and the crew follows the drawing every time.
Dietary needs without numbers. Nobody can plate “some vegetarians”; they can plate six.
No version number or on-site contact. Staff can’t tell which copy is current, and when rain moves the ceremony indoors there’s no one to call.
BEO software vs a spreadsheet
A spreadsheet template is fine until the details change, which they always do. Every change then gets retyped from the email into the proposal, the contract, the invoice, the BEO and the floorplan, and one of them gets missed.
MyVenueHQ builds the BEO from the booking, so the date, room, client and guest count are already there. You fill in the schedule, the menu with dietary restrictions, the bar and last call, room setup, staffing by role and special requests. The event’s floorplan from the floorplan builder attaches to the room setup and prints on the kitchen copy, and each BEO is approved or sent back to draft with notes.
It’s on the free plan, for up to 20 events a month. For a single event, the free BEO template needs no account at all.
BEO questions.
What does BEO stand for?
Banquet event order. In hospitality it’s the operating plan for one event at a hotel, venue or restaurant. Some venues call it an event order (Marriott says EO) or a function sheet; it’s the same document.
Who writes the BEO?
Usually the event manager or catering sales manager. They build it from the contract and the client’s choices, get the client’s approval, then send it to the kitchen, bar and floor.
When should a BEO be final?
On the guarantee date in your contract, the day the client commits to a guest count. Anything that changes after that goes out as a numbered revision.
Is a BEO legally binding?
Not on its own. The contract sets price and terms; the BEO sets how the event runs. Once the client signs it, though, most venues treat it as part of the agreement, so the counts and prices on a signed BEO are what you bill. If the two disagree, your contract should say which one wins.
What is a beo wedding?
A wedding BEO is the banquet event order for one wedding: ceremony and reception times, the menu with entrée counts and allergies, the bar, the room flip, vendor meals and staffing. The sample above is one.
What does beo mean in restaurants?
Banquet event order, the same as in hotels and venues. A restaurant that takes private dining or buyouts writes one per party so the kitchen and the floor work from the same menu, count and timings.
What should a beo include?
Event details and a version number, the on-site contact, the guest count, a timeline, the menu with dietary counts, the bar, the room setup, staffing and special requests. Many venues add a billing summary on the manager’s copy.
How to write a beo?
Start from the signed contract and the proposal, fill in the event details and on-site contact, write the timeline in the order staff live it, add the menu with counts, then the room, bar and staffing. Have the client approve it and send one version to every department.
What is the standard service sequence for a banquet?
For a plated dinner: seat the guests, pour water and wine, serve the first course, clear it, serve mains, clear again, then dessert and coffee. Serving the head table first is the old convention; plenty of venues now go table by table. The BEO timeline gives each course a time so the kitchen and the floor move together.
How many BEOs does one event need?
One per function is the usual rule. A wedding with ceremony, cocktails and dinner often fits on one; a conference with three meals in three rooms gets three.
Free BEO template 
Free event floor plan maker 
Free catering food calculator