As the trade show industry is slowly awakening from its' COVID-induced coma, there will be several changes made to catering and banqueting for exhibitors. To date, there has been much written and discussed regarding overall venue cleaning, social distancing, and food safety, which has served as a jumping-off point for the overall events industry. But regarding hosted food and beverage specifics, there has been limited information to date.

I have spoken with reputable hotel catering departments and convention center catering companies about their current best-practice steps. What I cannot stress enough is the word, "current,"" as this is going to continue to evolve, and catering companies are still in the process of thinking it through. For now, I recommend relying on the basics of group catering 101 until everyone gets more acclimated to our new normal. Below are a few tips and tricks to consider when you find your end of the events business coming back online.

1. Labor, Labor, and More Labor
This is going to be one of the biggest changes in the hosted- and exhibitor-catering scene. Exhibitors who order catering that is being served in the convention center meeting space will need to be prepared to pay added labor costs for additional servers to assist with pouring coffee and handing out food.
Are buffets coming back? Absolutely! The director of catering at a major convention center said he is looking at having salads and desserts in sealed containers while staffers serve hot food. This same scenario will happen on the trade show floor for those exhibitors who serve hot meals to their customers. With this buffet lunch scenario, exhibitors will have added kitchen labor to package the food, plus banqueting labor to serve it. On a final note, make sure all added banquet labor is charged at a four-hour minimum, so you can use this staff for other duties as needed.

2. Bulk Beverage Drink Service
Currently when you order coffee, it is dropped off in your exhibit with all condiments. What I have learned is that moving forward that will likely happen in of three ways:

• Labor may be required to pour coffee and mix in condiments.
• Automatic pour spouts will make coffee service more of a drop-and-go operation.
• Catering will continue to drop off the coffee, but exhibitors may be required to sign a form releasing the venue of any liability.

Currently, all snacks for breaks are pre-packaged. Ideally, if you have an attendant, he or she will pour coffee, mix in guest's condiments, and hand out snack choices. Therefore, it is recommended that food choices be limited for the foreseeable future.

3. Essential Deadlines
I recall from my days as a catering manager at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, that we always had a rush of exhibitors for larger shows who waited until the last minute to order catering for their stand. In a post-COVID world, that kind of procrastination is going to be difficult and expensive.
It will be difficult because catering companies are not going to keep the same kind of food and beverage inventory on hand as they'll be working harder than ever to control costs and inventory. And it will be expensive because if exhibitors order past the deadline, they could be subject to surcharges of 25 percent or more. The exhibitor catering surcharge game is something convention centers have played around with for the past few years. Luckily, it has been met with resistance thus far, but it may come to fruition in a post-COVID world.


Claire Gould is a seasoned professional when it comes to designing and negotiating food and beverage for exhibitors and Fortune 200 companies all over the world. Her specialization is menu design, managing budgets, and working with the chefs and banquets. Please email any questions at [email protected].