Tax help for caterers and private chefs
Whether you file a Schedule C, an LLC, or an S-corp, the person preparing your return should already know what a commissary invoice is and why one wedding shows up on two forms.
Nothing is due today. Personal returns start at $250.
Your money arrives out of order. A deposit lands months before the event, the balance lands the week after, and in between you have already paid for food, rentals, and the people working the floor. That timing, plus year end forms that can report the same wedding twice, is what makes a catering return different from a simple service business.
What caterers can usually deduct
Ordinary and necessary costs of your work. Rules and dollar limits change year to year, so we confirm every one of these against the current year when we prepare your return.
Food and drink you buy to sell
Proteins, produce, dry goods, bar stock, ice, and the cake you sourced from a bakery down the street. This is cost of goods sold and it gets tracked separately from anything you eat yourself.
Food you buy to serve a paying client is not a "meal" expense, so the partial limit on business meals does not apply to it. Your own lunch on a local job is a different thing and usually is not deductible at all, because you are not traveling away from home. Keep those receipts in two piles.
Commissary and rented kitchen time
Hourly or monthly rent at a shared commercial kitchen, plus the walk-in and dry storage you rent there, the key fob, and the cleaning fee they charge after a heavy production day.
Hold on to the signed kitchen agreement. If anyone ever asks where you produce food, a health permit tied to an address plus a rental invoice answers it in one move.
Event rentals and disposables
Chafers, induction burners, linens, china, glassware, flatware, tents, and the delivery and pickup fees the rental house adds. Disposables count too: sternos, foil pans, deli cups, gloves, cocktail napkins, to-go boxes.
If you re-bill rentals to the client, the rental cost is your deduction and the amount you billed is your income. Do not net the two and report only your markup. Both numbers belong on the return.
Event staff and contract labor
Servers, bartenders, dishwashers, prep cooks, and the captain who runs the floor. What you pay them is deductible whether they are on payroll or working as independent contractors.
How you classify each person matters. If you set the schedule, supply the tools, and direct how the work gets done, that person generally looks like an employee rather than a contractor, and payroll rules follow. Get a completed Form W-9 from anyone you treat as a contractor before the first shift, and issue a Form 1099-NEC to those who cross the reporting threshold for that year. Anyone you treat as an employee completes Form W-4 and Form I-9 instead, and their pay runs through payroll.
Your vehicle and the miles between jobs
Runs from the commissary to the venue, from the venue back to the restaurant supply house, and out again for the second load. You can claim the business share of the vehicle using the IRS standard mileage rate for that year or your actual costs such as gas, insurance, repairs, and depreciation. You choose one method and follow the rules that come with it, and either way only the business portion counts.
Trips between home and a regular work location are commuting and are not deductible. Once your work day has started, miles from one work location to another are business miles. Whether a run from home to a job site counts turns on facts such as whether your home is your principal place of business, so bring the log and we will sort it rather than guess. A refrigeration unit or other equipment added to the van is treated as equipment, not as a running cost, so keep that invoice separate.
Smallwares and equipment
Knives, hotel pans, Cambros and hot boxes, induction burners, sheet pans, a vacuum sealer, a portable hand sink, the used reach-in you bought at auction. Sharpening and repairs belong here too.
Small items are normally deducted in the year you buy them. Larger equipment is normally written off over several years, though elections exist to deduct more of it up front. Keep the invoice together with the date you first put the item to work, because that date drives the treatment.
Licenses, permits, and food safety
Your catering license, health department plan review and inspection fees, temporary event permits pulled venue by venue, food handler or ServSafe certification and renewals, and the permit that lets you pour alcohol.
Fees to keep a certification current are deductible. Education that qualifies you for a brand new trade is not, so a culinary program you completed before you were in business is treated differently from a recertification class you took last spring.
Insurance written for events
General liability, liquor liability, product liability, commercial auto on the van, and workers compensation if you carry staff. The certificates of insurance venues demand before they open the loading dock come out of these policies.
Health insurance you buy for yourself is not a business expense on Schedule C. Self-employed health insurance has its own place on the return and follows its own rules, so bring the premium statements separately.
Chef coats, aprons, and kitchen shoes
Logo chef coats, branded aprons and hats, and protective footwear you wear only on the job, plus what you spend laundering them.
Work clothing is deductible only when the work requires it and it is not suitable for wearing outside of work. A logo chef coat you wear only on the job is the clearest case. The black slacks and white button-downs you buy for your servers are not, because anyone could wear them anywhere. Protective items sit in between and turn on the facts, so bring the receipts and we will look at each one.
Tastings and menu development
Food, rentals, and staff hours for a tasting you host for a prospective wedding or corporate client, and the ingredients you use testing a new menu.
The rules that separate a business meal from entertainment are specific, and part of what you spend on a tasting can be limited. Write down the date, who attended, and which event or prospect it was for, and keep tasting costs separate from food bought for paid jobs. Without that note the receipt reads as groceries and there is nothing to support it with.
Marketing, listings, and lead fees
Bridal show and expo booth fees, listings on wedding and event platforms, printed menus and cards, food photography, your website and domain, and paid social ads aimed at your service area.
Platform commissions and lead fees are deductible, but they are usually pulled out before the money reaches you. Report the full contract amount as income and the fee as an expense, not the smaller number that hit your account.
Card fees, software, and refunds
Processor fees on every deposit and final payment, proposal and event management software, invoicing and scheduling tools, bookkeeping software, and bank fees on the business account.
Refunded deposits and cancelled events need a paper trail. A refund is not invisible, it has to be recorded so your reported sales line up with what the processor reports for the year.
A catering business normally starts on Schedule C and can stay there for a long stretch. The conversation changes when your profit is steady enough to pay yourself a real wage through payroll, or when you have employees, a signed commissary lease, and a van titled to the business, because that is when an S-corp election can start to earn what it costs to run. It is a math question we run on your actual numbers, not a rule of thumb.
What to bring us
You do not need all of it to start. Send what you have and your checklist shows what is still open.
- Every Form 1099-NEC and Form 1099-K you received, even the ones you think are duplicates
- Bank and card statements for every account money moved through, including a personal account you used for a few jobs
- Your event list for the year: date, client, total charged, deposit taken, balance collected, staff paid
- Food and supply receipts from wholesale and restaurant supply houses, warehouse clubs, and grocery runs
- Commissary or kitchen rental invoices, plus invoices from your rental and equipment vendors
- Mileage log or app export, and the purchase or lease paperwork on the van or vehicle
- Records for everyone you paid: name, address, SSN or EIN, total amount, and a completed Form W-9 for each contractor
- Insurance policies and premium statements, plus receipts for licenses, permits, and certification renewals
- Receipts for larger equipment purchases with the date you first put each item to work
- Last year's tax return and any state sales tax returns you filed
What trips people up
Calling the home kitchen a home office.
The home office deduction requires space used regularly and exclusively for the business. A kitchen your family also eats in fails the exclusive use test, so that claim is hard to support if anyone asks. A dedicated room, or a garage bay used only to store catering equipment, is a different and often better conversation. Bring photos and rough measurements and we will look at it straight.
Reporting only what landed in the bank.
Your card processor reports gross sales on Form 1099-K. If you report the amount left after fees and chargebacks, your return will not match that form, and a mismatch is what draws a notice. Report the gross, then take the fees as an expense. The bottom line lands in the same place and the numbers line up.
Paying event staff in cash with no record.
Paying cash is legal. Paying cash with nothing written down is what costs you, because an undocumented deduction is hard to defend and you still carry the classification exposure. Get a completed Form W-9 from each contractor before the first shift and keep a signed sheet for every event with name, date, hours, and amount.
Counting the same dollar twice.
A corporate client may send you a Form 1099-NEC for a job that also ran through your card processor and showed up again on a Form 1099-K. Bring both forms plus your event list so we can match every form to a real job instead of stacking them on top of each other.
Treating collected sales tax as income.
Money you collect as sales tax belongs to the state, not to you. Park it where you can see it, file the state returns on schedule, and bring copies of what you filed so your books and your sales tax returns tell the same story.
What it costs
Our published list, the same one everyone sees. Prices marked "from" are starting points, and your exact number is confirmed in writing before any work begins.
$0 is due today. You pay when you sign, or you can have your fee come out of your refund, so it can be $0 out of pocket.
Questions we get from your trade
Do I need an LLC or an S-corp to write things off?+
No. A sole proprietor filing Schedule C deducts the same costs a single member LLC does. An LLC is mostly about liability, which is worth taking seriously when you are cooking for a room full of guests, and that is a conversation for an attorney. An S-corp election is a tax decision that only starts to make sense once your profit is consistent and large enough to support a reasonable wage through payroll. We will tell you when you are there rather than sell it to you early.
My clients pay by Zelle, Venmo, and card. Do I report the jobs with no form?+
Yes. Income is income whether or not anyone issues a form. The forms are a reporting tool, not the definition of what counts. Bring every account the money passed through, including a personal one you used for a few weekend jobs, and we will build the number from the actual deposits.
Do I have to charge sales tax on catering?+
Usually some part of the bill is taxable, but which part depends on your state and sometimes your county. States treat prepared food, rentals, and the labor or service charge line differently from each other. That is a state matter separate from your federal return, and we keep it as its own item so it does not get buried in the 1040 work.
How do tips and service charges get handled?+
A mandatory service charge is your business income, even when you pass all of it to your crew, and when you pass it to an employee it is wages that run through payroll. A tip a guest leaves voluntarily belongs to the worker who earned it, and tips paid to employees still carry reporting and withholding duties for you. What you pay out is deductible to you, and how it gets reported depends on whether that worker is an employee or a contractor. Label the two lines clearly on your contracts so the answer is written down before we ever see it.
Do I pay tax during the year or wait until I file?+
Nobody withholds for you, and self-employment tax on Schedule SE comes due alongside income tax. The IRS expects payment through the year rather than all at once at filing. Catering income is lumpy, heavy in wedding and holiday season and quiet in between, so we look at the calendar you actually work when we set your payments instead of assuming an even year.
I only cater a handful of events a year. Is that even a business?+
If you do it to make money, take clients, and run it in a businesslike way, it is a business. You file Schedule C and you deduct your costs. Volume does not decide it. Profit motive and how you operate do, and if there is no real profit motive the rules limit what you can deduct, so that is worth being straight about up front.
Let us take the tax part off your plate.
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