What’s the “norm” for whole class parties in your area?

[Namechanger67]

London suburb here. DD is in reception and we have attended 2 parties so far. Both for the whole class and both in a village hall with entertainer. I looked into prices and overall cost (venue plus entertainer plus food and drinks) would be close to £700 and this is without adding the party bags. Seems quite a lot to me but now DD is really keen on having a party similar to the ones we have been to.
I don’t have much experience with bday parties so far, what is the “norm” (provided there isn’t such thing) at reception age normally? Is this a reasonable price to spend at this age or am I right to be a bit shocked?

Where do you live??! Our village hall costs £10 an hour and an entertainer for my daughters party last month cost £200…

The community hall here my friends have used is £125 for two hours, includes a bouncy castle. Decent sized city suburbs. I imagine entertainers vary a lot depending on what they offer - from a quick google local magician, circus and disco parties seem to be between £150 to £200 for two hours. Food it depends if you're paying for catering, are buying supermarket sandwich and snack platters, or making some basic sandwiches and things at home.

I’m I live near Bradford, church hall is ten pounds an hour and entertainers are approx £250, if we go to a venue like soft play or bounce park it’s approx £10 per child so a class of thirty gets to be between £350 and £400 but those venues tend to feed them and include party bags. £700 seems bonkers to me, but then again we think a whole class party at £300 is also too expensive. We’ve always done smaller ones at home eg 10-20 kids. Half the price, twice the work though

As I wrote in the post I live in the London suburbs (affluent area).
Village halls around here are anything between £100-£200 for 2-3 hours and most of the entertainers I have contacted are asking for £280/£350 for 2 hours.
Then add food and drinks for 30 kids, drinks and nibbles for parents and party bags and basic decorations like balloons, tablecloths, plates and glasses etc and you can easily spend £700+

You could do a joint birthday party and share the cost? That’s common up north too

In our area it’s normal for several children to share a party

Yes maybe but I don’t know many people yet, not sure which kids celebrate in the same month

We did a whole class party for DS(5) last month. It probably cost around £500 - we went to a trampoline park where each child cost £20 and there were twenty two (sixteen in his class plus a couple of friends from nursery and my NCT group.)

It was a lot but they had a brilliant time.

I’ve never come across this (East Midlands.)

I’m in London too, my kids are a bit older but I recall whole class parties costing £400-500 about 5-7 years ago. So I guess £700 now is about right with costs of everything having gone up.

Definitely see if you can share - sharing parties splits the cost and also takes up less of everyone’s weekends. DD has shared a party with one, two or even three other kids in the past.

I also know a family where the party is the main present for their child, so they can either have a massive party and small gift or the opposite

East mids here, we went with Leisure centre where we had the sports hall with a bouncy castle, softplay stuff, tables and chairs, that was £120 for 2 and a half hours, we did a 2 hr party and had 15 mins either side for set up and take down. Food was about £100-150 on top with the supermarket cake included. Party bags less than £50 for 30 kids once the bags, sweets, and plastic cone bags were factored in.

We didn’t have entertainers as found there was plenty of entertainment with the bouncy castle, a corner set up with music, a table set up with pick n mix so they could make sweet cones, the soft play and 30 mins in the middle for food and cake.

We kept everything as simple as possible.

Party bags - slice of cake, sweet cone they made themselves one year, biscuits they decorated another year, as many balloons as they wanted to take home from the decorations we put up (very helpful with the tidying)

Food - went with a vegetarian menu, no allergies which made it easier.

• One year - sandwiches (cheese or jam), selection of fruit and veg (cherry tomatoes, mini cucumbers, berries, melon slices), selection of biscuits (jammy dodgers, chocolate fingers), cheap mix of crisp packs, selection of mini cakes (Mr Kipling style/mini-rolls), box of nice biscuits for any adults who wanted to hang around, big jugs of squash.
• Another year we found a takeaway that had a great lunch time deal and ordered 10 XL pizzas and a few sides. Jugs of squash for drinks and it was brilliant, so easy. I had taken some ziplock bags in my clean up kit so a few kids took slices home as we had loads leftover.

Decorations - colourful paper tableclothes and a crap tonne of balloons blown up and thrown everywhere, they look effective and become part of the entertainment because they throw them and turn them into a game.

Thank you. I don't really know any of the parents yet so not sure who is also having a bday at the same time as DD and also not sure I'd feel comfortable asking to share a party at this stage. Maybe next year I will know people better.
We could afford it as grandparents are usually also generous with cash and we could put that towards the party as well but it just seems a bit nuts to be honest!!!

I meant that they usually give DD money for the bday, not that we would normally ask them for cash randomly! So the bday £££ they will give her could go towards the party, that's what I meant!

Ah yes, I forgot the cake!!!

See if you can borrow/hire the plates, cups etc. we have a ‘stuff library’ as part of a community eco initiative nearby so you can hire plastic plates, cups, jugs, cutlery etc for £10 and it’s the full kit with enough for 30 people.

Thanks, will check. Although tbh that's the smaller expense as can buy cheap ones on Amazon. It is mainly the venue hire + entertainment which is the bulk.

I'm in outer SW London. Hall hire is £26ph + £26 admin fee. So £103 for 3hrs. Disco lady charges £200 for 90 minutes and then food comes to £50 for children and another £50 for adult drinks? So £400 all in. It was roughly the same to hire out soft play in a leisure centre. Or 10 friends to a trampoline park for £250. We've done solo parties and joint.

Do you need to do one? Honestly I think they are almost always just a bit shit. Too many kids for meaningful interactions, the ones we’ve been to have been kids DD1 doesn’t play with at school so everyone just breaks off into their own groups, it costs a fortune. £700 just for the party when I bet at least half the kids won’t even interact with your daughter the entire time is nuts.

I suppose I’m lucky in that DD1 has never wanted that kind of party, she’s always just wanted kids she actually plays with and something like a craft party or similar. I’ve never offered whole class though, although she’s been to several and I think she did enjoy them but the same way she would enjoy me taking her to soft play on her own for a couple of hours.

Have you looked into hiring out a soft play instead? Surely this would be cheaper with food included (although maybe in London the soft plays are super swanky in comparison to the Welsh valleys!)

That is standard for around here (London) too, but if you search around the venues and entertainers can really vary in cost so worth asking around. You could also consider:

• a joint party (other parents will also like the idea of sharing costs!)
• if summer then party have it in a park
• instead of an entertainer, hire a bouncy castle and run your own party games
• reducing costs of food/decorations (lots round here don't bother with tablecloths etc and just do basic food. No one cares)

That seems madness. We only did one whole of class party, as one childwas the right age in the covid years. It cost nothing like that at a local gymnastics centre. It was a set amount for 15 children, then £5 each after that, with us having to provide food and drink. It was probably a couple of hundred all in. A good third of the class couldn't make it, so price per head worked out better.

No soft play for 30+ kids will be just as expensive if not much more

I’m in Surrey and did a whole class party in November as it was still early in the term and my son was still getting to know everyone.
I looked into different options but went with a soft play in the end that gave us exclusive hire for 2 hours and they provided the lunch boxes for 30 kids, think it was £650 so with cake, a bunch of helium balloons & party bags it was around £700, but we didn’t have to do any set up or make any sandwiches at least!
I figured this will be the only year we’ll do it, and then will do smaller things once he’s found his ‘group’
Do you have any leisure centres around, the ones near us have small soft play or bouncy castle set ups that work out cheaper?

Thank you. Glad to see that it isn’t so uncommon then.
I have found a couple of venues that also offer the soft play or bouncy castle within. One is £300 but then you need to bring all the food, drinks, tableware and decorations etc
The other one is around £550 but they also provide food for 30 kids (you still have to bring own tableware and cake though).
So overall I’d say price range is £500-£700 depending on how much you are willing to do yourself