Wedding Reception locations that DON'T cater (Minneapolis, Stillwater: houses, buy, live)

[t_elsmore]

Does anyone know of any wedding reception locations that do not require that you use their catering services? Additionally, does anyone know a place that would let us sell our own alcohol with a liquire license, instead of hiring their workers? It seems any place we check we have to pay 20-30 a plate via their catering services, ridiculous.

Looking for a reception hall or banquet room of some type where we can bring in our own food for 200-300 people.

[golfgal]

The Old Courthouse in Stillwater lets you bring in your own caterer but I don't think it holds that many people. Do you HAVE a liquor license? That might be an issue in some towns. Many VFW type places also let you bring in your own caterer but you probably have to use their bar/bartender.

You could also try Emerald Greens Golf course. I don't THINK they have a caterer you have to use. I know the Rosemount Community Center allows you to bring in your own caterer but again, not sure about the liquor thing.

[golfgal]

I just looked and Emerald Greens golf course only has seating for 175 people.

[Haver]

Centennial Lakes allows you to use your own catering (not sure on alcohol), but their main building only houses 120 -- but you can go ice skating in the pond afterwards if its wintertime :-)

[bhdavis1978]

We just got married in Vancouver. I don't have specific advice for Minneapolis, cause I don't live there (yet)- but I do have a wedding cost reducing tip.

We offered our guests fancy bottled soda (Jones soda, I don't know if they have this in the US?) instead of only offering the typical stuff like Coke, Pepsi, etc. They went crazy for it. We had 90 guests and I bought 84 bottles of pop, mainly thinking that the kids would like to have something good to drink, but the adults drank it. This meant they didn't drink as much alcohol (which costs like $5 / drink versus $1.25 / drink for the fancy pop), and we could buy our own from costco (cheap!) - no liquor license problems. Second it meant we had very few really drunk people- I think we only had two visibly drunk people, and our friends are drinkers.

People liked it - it was fun.

[mdwstrnkid]

Originally Posted by t_elsmore

Does anyone know of any wedding reception locations that do not require that you use their catering services? Additionally, does anyone know a place that would let us sell our own alcohol with a liquire license, instead of hiring their workers? It seems any place we check we have to pay 20-30 a plate via their catering services, ridiculous.

Looking for a reception hall or banquet room of some type where we can bring in our own food for 200-300 people.

I didn't get married back in the Cities, but it seems to me that $20-30 for a plated meal seems pretty reasonable. In the Bay Area (where I live now), I'd doubt that you'd find too many places that would be a plated dinner for much less than double that amount...