Christmas Catering Melbourne

Most caterers won't put a number on a Christmas page. We checked the first page of Google in September 2026: of the ten Melbourne sites ranking for Christmas catering, one published a price. Here are ours, and here is what four real parties come to.

• Christmas morning tea for 20. Bite-sized Christmas sweets at $9.90 a serve and a tea and coffee station at $4.85 a head. $295, or $14.75 each.
• Christmas team lunch at the desks, 20 people. The Christmas Lunch Combo at $29.90 a head (ham and turkey sliders, salad cups, festive treats) plus a cannoli selection at $4.10. $680, or $34 each.
• Stand-up party for 40. Cold Christmas sliders at $6.90, arancini at $5.15, mini gourmet pies at $5.25, prawn and green mango salad cups at $7.45, and a serve of Christmas sweets at $9.90 per person. $1,386, or $34.65 a head for four savoury pieces and a sweet.
• Sit-down Christmas buffet for 40. The Christmas Buffet at $54.90 a head, two festive mains with all the sides and sweets, plus tea and coffee at $4.85. $2,390, or $59.75 each.

The one Melbourne caterer we found publishing Christmas prices sells a carved-meat package from $45 a head, a premium version from $65 and a top tier from $85. Our buffet sits between their first two tiers. The lunch combo undercuts all three, because it is a lunch and not a full function.

Seafood is where a Christmas budget usually goes sideways. A Christmas seafood platter (20 king prawns, smoked salmon and mussels) is $199, so two platters cover 40 people at roughly $9.95 a head on top of whatever else you order. A dozen freshly shucked oysters with lemon, salsa and mignonette is $39.90. Decide on the seafood before you set the budget. It is much harder to add later.

The shape of the party drives the budget, the room setup and how much organising lands on you. Melbourne office Christmas parties almost always fall into one of four.

• Stand-up finger food. People mingle, nobody needs a seat, and the food arrives on platters. Best for large groups, tight offices and parties where people drift in and out after work. Order generously, because standing guests keep eating.
• Sit-down buffet. Two festive mains with sides and sweets, served from a table in the boardroom or breakout space. It feels like a proper Christmas lunch without a restaurant booking or the walk back at three o'clock.
• Individual Christmas lunch boxes. One box per person, labelled, no shared platters. This suits a team that is half in the office and half remote, or a floor that would rather eat at their desks than stand around.
• Grazing tables and platters. A long table of charcuterie, cheese, dips and fruit that people pick at for two hours. Our grazing platters run from $58 to $84 depending on the size, and they pair well with a shorter drinks window.

This is the question we get asked most, and offices get it wrong in both directions. For a stand-up party running two hours or less, budget four to five pieces a head. Past two hours, or if the party replaces dinner, go to six or seven. A buffet is priced per person and already accounts for the quantities, so you don't need to add anything except sweets if you want them.

For a seated Christmas lunch, one box or one buffet serve per person is enough. Overspending usually happens on the extras: three kinds of dessert for a group of fifteen, or a seafood platter on top of a buffet that already includes prawns. Underspending happens on stand-up parties that run past 6pm, where four pieces a head starts to look thin.

December is the one month where the ordering deadlines stop being a formality. The kitchen runs at capacity, the drivers are booked out, and glazed ham and turkey are ordered in against confirmed numbers instead of held on the shelf. These are the deadlines that apply to your booking.

• Up to 20 people: cancellations by 4pm the business day before the event.
• 20 to 50 people: two business days before the event.
• 50 or more people: five business days before the event.
• Functions over $4,000: a 50% deposit confirms the booking, and that deposit is non-refundable if you cancel within seven working days of the date.
• Weekend dates: available on request, with a 15% surcharge and a minimum spend. We take weekend bookings above $1,000.

For a normal weekday order, 3pm the day before is the cutoff for next-day delivery. Around eight times in ten we can still fill a same-day order, and a $10 fee may apply. Call 1300 322 240 for those; email won't be read fast enough. In the first fortnight of December that success rate drops, so treat the 3pm cutoff as a hard one.

Final menu selections are due 24 hours out, and changes to a confirmed booking need to be in writing 48 hours before the event. If your headcount is still moving, tell us the range when you book instead of waiting for a final number.

We deliver between 7am and 5:30pm on weekdays. Delivery is free to the CBD, Docklands and St Kilda Road precincts on catering orders over $80; under $80 a $10 delivery fee may apply. Outside those precincts, delivery is available on request and a fee applies. The minimum order is $80, or $200 if you are more than 15 km from the CBD.

Timing matters more at Christmas than it does the rest of the year, because parties start on the hour and rooms get handed over. Cold food may arrive up to 90 minutes before your confirmed delivery time, hot food up to 15 minutes before. If we are late, tell us within an hour of the due time and we will credit the order. That applies to orders under $1,000 placed by 5pm the day prior.

All prices include GST. Corporate accounts pay by invoice 14 days after the event, which often decides whether the booking happens in November or waits on a purchase order in December.

Christmas is the worst party of the year to get this wrong, because it is the one everyone turns up to. Our menu has dedicated gluten free, vegan and vegetarian sections, and every sandwich product is built with 15% vegetarian as standard. Special dietary items are labelled and packed separately to reduce the risk of cross-contamination.

Put the detail in the special instructions field when you order, or in the quote form below. Name coeliac and severe allergy requirements specifically. A general request for gluten free options doesn't cover them.

We cover Melbourne CBD and metro — Southbank, Docklands, Richmond, Cremorne, Collingwood, South Melbourne, Port Melbourne, St Kilda Road, Hawthorn, Box Hill, Clayton and out to Tullamarine. Offices, warehouses, showrooms, studios and function rooms your business controls.

What we can't do is cater inside a venue that holds exclusive catering rights. Most hotel function floors and purpose-built conference venues won't admit outside food, and that is worth checking before you plan a menu. If your Christmas party is in a hired space, ask the venue about external caterers first and we will work around whatever they say.

Six that come up on nearly every December call, answered the way we'd answer them on the phone.

For a December date, book in October or early November. The first two weeks of December go first, and the Thursdays and Fridays before mid-December are the hardest days to get. A booking is confirmed once we send an order confirmation, or once the deposit clears on functions over $4,000.

With us, between $14.75 a head for a Christmas morning tea and about $60 a head for a full sit-down buffet with tea and coffee. Stand-up finger food parties land around $35. Add roughly $10 a head if you want a seafood platter on the table.

Yes, on request. Weekend orders carry a 15% surcharge and a minimum spend, and we take weekend bookings above $1,000. Give us as much notice as you can. Weekend driver availability in December is the constraint, not the kitchen.

Yes. Above 50 people the five-business-day cancellation window applies, and above $4,000 we take a 50% deposit to confirm. For groups that size we usually recommend a buffet or a grazing table over piece-counted finger food, because it is easier to serve and easier to budget.

Individual Christmas lunch boxes solve it. One labelled box per person, delivered to the office for whoever is in, with no shared platters to divide. It also takes the guesswork out of a headcount that changes on the morning.

Disposable napkins are complimentary on request, so mention it when you order. Plates, cutlery, cups and other disposables can be added for a fee at the time of ordering. Our platters stay our property and we collect them after your event, so leave them somewhere we can find them.

Send us the date, the number of people, the room and roughly what you want to spend a head, and we will come back with a costed menu. If your numbers are still moving, give us the range. We have catered Melbourne office Christmas parties for over 30 years and we run 250 deliveries a day across the city. Early December dates go first, so it is worth getting yours in the diary now.