| Hi Sri, I got in touch with Jackknife, enquiring about hosting an event there. A guy named Phillip is working with me on this enquiry. So far, the dates between 19-22 Sept is good for them (we haven’t decided which day yet right?) I told him we want to keep it casual as the idea is for our guests to move around and mingle with a few bites and drinks after a whole day of conference. And we don't necessarily want to buyout the whole bar. We also want to preorder food; some pre-set finger food items laid out buffet style which allows our guests to get food as they please. He came up with a proposal; For a party of 150-160, we will not be charged a minimum spend; Jackknife will only charge a reservation/set-up fee of $500. They’ll make the back half of Jackknife private for us, so we can have a home base of some sorts, and that has a capacity of 100. We are still free to mingle at the front of the bar anytime! They cater for small bites/hors d’oeuvres and he’s given us (as attached) their current winter menu for price range reference. He said the menu will look a little different by September. I did tell him for drinks, we maybe want to cover only the first one, and if the guests want more, they can always purchase from the bar themselves. Phillip and I haven’t talked in detail about the drinks part yet. So, I think this Jackknife could work really well for the following reasons; 1) It is walking distance from Eliot Centre, so better chances of a lot of people joining this event 2) $500 is very reasonable, considering the other top choice of the rooftop terrace is charging a similar venue rental rate i.e. $500 for first 3 hours. 3) One point of vendor contact for everything; venue, food and drinks. No need to deal with thinking about set-up or renting extra bistro tables etc. Oh, and he said he would love to show us around to give a better idea for the set-up and asked if I’m free next week. He seems very helpful to make this work for us and Jackknife. Haven’t told him I’m not in Portland :) So Sri, would you want to meet up with him? Let me know so I can help arrange something and put you both in touch. If any of you have any comments/thoughts on this, feel free to add on :) |
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