To not do food at a 6 yr old birthday party?

[yellowgecko]

I’m organising a village hall party on a Saturday, 2pm-4pm. The plan is to do a kids disco, and put out bowls of sweets and crisps, do the cake towards the end and give everyone a party bag on leaving.
I think we’ll end up with around 25 kids. I’m just fed up of going to parties and seeing all the food waste!

AIBU - yes you need to do a buffet / proper food
YANBU - snacks are fine, no one will starve

You can easily do some sandwiches and sausage rolls, and that’s it! I feel like at every party you see so much food going to waste because people tend to over-cater.

Everyone will bitch about you behind your back and call you a tight arse if you don't provide food! I know from having been at a foodless kids party 😆

Crazy isn't it. It smacks of only wanting a party for the gifts,and wanting to put the bare minimum effort into hosting a party 🙄🤦 So lazy.

I've done parties without food, nobody cared!
I was one of the first to do it in my kid's class & other parents actually thanked me for breaking the expectation. Several food free/snack only parties followed.

It’s logical and sensible. Kids don’t really need a party tea at 3pm and cake. However, people will hate you for it so you might as well just crack on and do a full on buffet however illogical it is.

It’s the ritual of sitting down together with friends and resting from all the games and excitement. I’d give a few sandwiches. Freeze the ones that aren’t used or hand out to the parents.

I've been to a couple of parties around that time where they just served snacks. One party did a bag of crisps, a bag of mini cookies and a piece of fruit each and the other party laid out some sweets/biscuits/strawberries and both were perfectly fine

I remember doing a football party around the same timings and we had a break for a snack, we did individual plates with chopped up and a cupcake and loads of drinks and then they went home with sweets in their party bags - which were a drinks bottle with a whistle on - they went down well! (With the kids!). We did put on the invites though that we were just serving a snack and drinks.

I've never attended or heard of a party where food isn't provided. I wouldn't be offended but I would expect it to be made very clear as I'd have fed my children accordingly.
I wouldn't do it personally though as it's part of the party.

Def not unreasonable - just warn in advance what you're doing.

How absolutely stingy and embarrassing. One bag of crisps and piece of fruit each. So miserable.

It’s fine not to do it but please let people know, so they plan accordingly. I wouldn’t mind feeding kids first but would hate if they were at party hungry and just grazing non stop on sweets. I’ve only had this happen once and we left a little early as kids were quite hungry!

I would have food and cake. Possibly sandwich bags or pizzas. I’d not be serving bowls of sweets.

Some parents will not give their kids lunch since they assume they’ll be fed. You might say ‘well that’s on them’ but it will happen. And it would be you who ‘broke the contract’ that a kids party has proper food.

I wouldn’t have taken my children to a party without feeding them. But some do though. Maybe do as others have suggested some lunch bags. They just basically need a half sandwich. I just did a choice of ham cheese spread or jam when I did this. I wrote on the bags what was in the sandwiches and kept some spare back in case some didn’t like what was left. I got a choice of cartons of juice there was a kitchen to make tea and coffee for parents. But some of the parents wanted a cold drink and we didn’t have enough. So jugs of squash would have been better. Some crisps and packets of mini biscuits. Hotdogs always go down well and they only expect. Or just get some Greg’s sausage rolls and cut in half and some crisps.

As long as everyone knows i don't think its an issue at all.

I really don’t think specifying that food will be provided on an invite is necessary, considering it’s the norm, not the exception.

You do, however, need to let parents know if food won’t be provided, so that they can feed their children before the party.

@Jk987

realistically those frozen sandwiches aren’t gonna get eaten are they? No one would fancy rhem

We had my son's 9th birthday party on Sunday in a gaming room. The venue advised us not to bring food as it never gets touched, but I gave in anyway through fear of opinions such as on this thread. It literally didnt get touched, despite me going round constantly asking the boys to eat. They were too busy dressing in costumes, singing on karaeoke, dancing to Just Dance and gaming to get anything. Its all being used for pack lunches this week but is likely to be mostly thrown out cos of short dates. Such a waste!

Bowl of jelly abd ice cream and then all sing happy bday abd cut the cake before they leave. Nice and easy

I don't think its unusual to just have drinks and snacks in the middle of an afternoon for a party.

Ooh lots to reply to!

-I would put on the invite that it would be snacks and drinks only to manage expectationS
-yes thinking I would get an entertainment package rather than a DIY disco to try and control the chaos
-healthy snack options would be available too, I take the point about sweets / choking hazard on board
-the hall has a small kitchen. I don’t want to be stuck in it prepping / cooking pizza for the whole party (yes we can make food at home, but there is always a degree of ‘prepping’ there)

I have never been to a kids party where there is no food waste. My child is a fussy eater and always leaves something.

For those concerned about my budget, I can afford to make some sandwiches, I appreciate your concern in this 😉 As the time is mid afternoon, not over meal time, I feel more inclined to supply snacks rather than full on sandwiches, platters etc which I know from experience won’t get eaten. I’d rather spend the money on a nicer party bag for the guests, or something for DD.
DD also prefers snack type food to a main meal, so she would like that as well.

i take on board the running around for 2 hours comments, something to break that up is a good idea. Maybe that’s when the snacks come out, and they’ve worked up an appetite.

To be clear, I’m not expecting to NOT feed the guests. It’s more about not providing a full-on ‘lunch’ experience.

I think this is where expectations differ through the country. It seems to be the norm here to provide food regardless of the time of day (and sometimes there is a lot left over if at an odd time like this party). However, where my sister lives, no food is provided! Just cake after singing happy birthday. Interesting to see if there is a geographical divide.

I didnt say “ no “ food waste.. but there’s a difference between leftovers and binning a lot of food.

If you're going to only give snacks, still make a proper snack time. You don't want any DC running around with grab and go food in their mouths.