Catering CRM
A CRM that knows a Saturday can only be sold once.
Your customer asked to change this booking
They asked for 135 guests — +$2,112.00 estimated.
“We’ve had a few more RSVPs than expected — can you do fifteen more?”
Nothing has changed yet — this booking still shows what you agreed. Asked 3 hours ago.
Review the requestAgainst a generic CRM
The four things a sales CRM cannot do
Not a criticism of them — they were built for a different job, and it shows on exactly these four.
Today
A deal has no date
You can put one in a custom field, but nothing stops you selling the same Saturday twice, because the CRM has no idea the two deals collide.
With CaterCloud
The date is the thing. A day that is full says so, on your site and in the pipeline, before anyone quotes it.
Today
A deal value does not move on its own
Head count goes 80 to 110 and someone retypes the number in four places — the quote, the shopping, the roster, the invoice.
With CaterCloud
Change the head count and the quote reprices, the costs follow, and the crew requirement moves with it.
Today
A "closed won" is not a deposit
A stage change is somebody’s opinion that the job is on. Money arriving is the fact, and it usually lives in a different system entirely.
With CaterCloud
The customer accepts and pays in their own portal, and that payment is what marks the job confirmed.
Today
It cannot tell you what the job made
A CRM knows what you charged. What the food, the crew, the travel and the gas took out of it is somewhere else, if it is anywhere.
With CaterCloud
Each event carries its own profit figure, with the costs it could not derive shown as gaps rather than as zero.
How it works
What happens to an enquiry
The same path a generic CRM would call a pipeline — except each step hands the next one real numbers.
It arrives as a customer, not an email
From your site, a form or a widget. The date, the head count and the service are already on the record rather than in a paragraph somebody has to read.
The pipeline advances itself where it can
A quote sent moves the card. A follow-up sequence fires without you remembering. The stage reflects what has actually happened, not what someone updated.
The customer decides in their own portal
They accept, they pay the deposit, and they can ask for a change without starting an email thread. The job becomes confirmed by an event, not by an opinion.
The record keeps what happened
What they were charged, what it cost, what they changed. The next quote for that customer starts from their history.
When it changes
What a change actually touches
One request from a customer moves four things. This is the part a pipeline stage cannot represent, and the part that eats an afternoon by hand.
Confirmed
Hartwell Wedding
$7,436.40
Proposed by the customer
Guests120140
VenueHawthorn HouseAbbotsford Convent
Sent from their portal. Nothing has been written.
Priced on the server
+$1,204.00
Still nothing written. It needs an answer.
Two arms, and there is no third
You approve
Crew shifts re-time only if your cascade policy says so. If it does not, they are flagged for you.
Nobody answers
Silence is never consent. An unanswered request expires rather than sitting on your diary forever.
A price INCREASE becomes an invoice. A price DECREASE is flagged for you to refund — nothing touches your customer’s card on its own.
03 — In their words
Caterers who love CaterCloud
“The moment I realised this was actually working was waking up in the morning and having the leads in my inbox already — without chasing the business. I've gone from one booking a month to three or four.”
Michelle
Owner, Michelle's Catering
50–60% of leads converted
“I run three businesses, so chasing quotes and back-of-house was really hard work. Now people order and pay through the website and get a quote instantly — I don't have to lift a finger.”
Mel
Owner, Junction Cafes
2–3 a day enquiries, was 2–3 a week · admin halved
“This software does it all for us — our invoicing's done, our payment schedules are done, the quoting tool's there. We can be asleep and still get leads. Without it, our truck would be sitting in the backyard not generating revenue.”
Steve & Amanda
Owners, Travelling Carnivores
45–55 quotes sent / month
“We've collected $40k just in deposits. Our calendar is filling up — we're actually in the process of getting a second van. One job alone basically paid for the whole system.”
Jacinto
Owner, Spanish Paella & Sangria
$40k in deposits
“These guys know how to improve your web page and the inquiries coming in. I'm three months into next year already confirmed — that's never happened in 12 years.”
Stephen
Woodfired pizza, Ablaze in the Valley
Who it is not for
When a generic CRM is the right answer
You sell subscriptions, not events
If nothing you sell has a date and a head count, everything above is overhead. A sales CRM is the correct tool.
Your team lives in one already
Switching a CRM is a real cost. If yours is working and the events half is genuinely fine in a spreadsheet, that is a legitimate answer.
You need deep sales reporting
CaterCloud reports on events and money, not on rep quota attainment or multi-stage forecast models.
Questions
What people ask about the CRM
- What is a catering CRM?
- A customer system built around events rather than deals: a date that can be double-booked, a head count that moves, a quote that reprices when it does, and a deposit that turns an enquiry into a confirmed job.
- Why not just use HubSpot or Salesforce?
- They model a sales pipeline beautifully and have no concept of a Saturday that is already full. Most caterers who try one end up running the events half in a spreadsheet beside it, which is two systems disagreeing rather than one working.
- Does it handle repeat corporate customers?
- Yes. A contact carries every event they have booked, what they were charged, what it cost you and what they asked to change — so the next quote starts from what actually happened rather than from a blank page.
- Can it chase a quote for me?
- There are follow-up sequences that fire on their own, and an automatic quote chaser is in beta. We would rather label it beta than let you find out.