5 Tips to More Efficient Catering Packing List or Pull Sheet Management

Hey Catering Business owners! My name is John Cohen – Founder of Total Party Planner also know as TPP!

Today I want to share 5 useful tips to a more efficient way to manage your catering pack lists. You may also refer to them as catering pull sheets. 

At the end of the blog feel free to click the link to download a great equipment template sheet outlining the basic needs for any catered event. So be sure to click that link.

Here we go 5 tips to manage your catering pack list or pull sheets and make sure everything gets to the event!

• Plan and prepare your pack sheet well in advance of the event. A quick meeting with the catering event coordinator and ops team can save an uncountable amount of trips back to the shop.
• Create “kits” of standard items you can just grab and go. Examples would be spice kit, cleaning kit, or even serving utensils.
• Have custom shelving built into your vehicle to keep standard equipment. Your items are always available! It also saves a lot of time in loading and unloading from your base facility.
• Label food clearly with the client name, event date, and venue. Don’t want to buy fancy labels? Masking tape and a sharpie can be just as effective
• Load your heavy equipment first and food last to maximize truck space. My Dad used to call this scientific loading and we never had to make 2 trips to the event venue!

Using an automated catering software system to associate equipment to menu items, beverages, and even other equipment can save hours of planning and unnecessary trips back to your facility. TPP is an example of such an automated system. 

Automated catering systems can save countless hours of planning AND real gas dollar saving from having to head back to your facility from the event to get those forgotten items.

Don’t forget to click this link to download the sample template checklist to help mange your packlist equipment process!

Thanks for reading. Have a great day!