How to Collect Guest Dietary Requirements and Get Them to the Caterer

Dietary requirements are one of the smallest jobs in event planning and one of the easiest to get wrong. The information arrives in pieces: a text from a cousin about a nut allergy, a note scribbled on a paper RSVP, a colleague who mentions they're vegan in passing. Then it has to reach two different places in two different forms. The caterer needs a list. The serving staff need to know, plate by plate, which guest is sitting where.

When those pieces live in a spreadsheet that's separate from the seating chart, every seating change risks breaking the link between a guest's meal and their seat. This guide covers how to collect dietary needs in one place, hand the caterer a clean list, and get the right plate to the right seat on the day, whether the event is a wedding, a gala, a fundraiser dinner or a conference banquet.

Two ways to collect dietary needs

Option 1: ask on your RSVP

The most reliable time to ask is when guests reply. They're already telling you they're coming, and they know their own needs better than anyone passing the message along.

With RSVP & Invitations, add a dietary question to your RSVP page. You can ask it per guest, so everyone in a household answers for themselves rather than one person guessing for the family.

Each guest's answer fills in their Dietary field automatically. There's no spreadsheet to copy across from a separate RSVP tool: the answer lands on the same guest you're seating, and from there it flows into your export and onto their place card.

Option 2: add a Dietary column to your guest list

If you're not collecting RSVPs online, or you already have dietary notes gathered somewhere else, put them in your guest spreadsheet.

1. Add a Dietary column

   In your Excel or CSV guest list, add a column headed "Dietary". "Dietary Requirements", "Dietary Needs", "Diet" and "Allergies" also work, so if your spreadsheet already has one of those, leave it as it is.

2. Write each need in plain words

   The column is free text: "Vegan, nut allergy", "Gluten free", "Halal". Leave a cell blank, or write "None" or "N/A", for guests with no requirements. Those cells are ignored.

3. Upload the sheet

   Upload it as you would any guest list. Each guest's dietary needs come in with their name.

You can also type or edit dietary needs per guest in the app, which is handy for the late message that arrives after everything else is done.

Keep dietary needs private

Dietary needs often include medical information: allergies, intolerances, conditions a guest may not want shared with the whole room. In Simplify Tables they're private to you as the organiser. They never appear on the seating plan guests open from the link or QR code. Guests find their table; nobody sees anyone else's dietary notes.

Send the caterer a clean list

When the caterer asks for final numbers, export your guest list to Excel or CSV. Dietary needs come through as a Dietary column next to each guest, ready to forward to the caterer or venue.

Because the list comes from the same guest list you're seating, there's no second spreadsheet to keep in sync. Export again whenever something changes.

Put dietary needs on the place cards

A caterer's list tells the kitchen how many vegan plates to make. It doesn't tell the server carrying them which seat each one goes to. That's what place cards are for.

Simplify Tables makes printable place cards from your seating plan: a card for every seated guest with their name and table, in the same fonts as your seating plan. You don't retype anything. Each card can also carry a small dietary symbol for the serving staff:

On folded cards, the symbols print on one side only, so they face the guest's own seat rather than the whole table. A dietary key page prints with the set so the venue has a reference for what each symbol means. If you'd rather leave symbols off, switch them off.

Card options

• Folded tent cards: 4 per page, 3.5 × 2.5 in once folded.
• Flat cards: 10 per page, business-card size.
• US Letter or A4. Print at home on card stock, or take the file to a print shop. Dashed cut lines and a dotted fold line are printed on the sheet.
• Order by table or A–Z, whichever suits how you'll lay them out.
• Add your event name to each card if you like.

You can preview the cards free before paying, and print as many times as you need, including after seating changes. If someone switches tables the day before, reprint and the card shows the new table.

What it costs

• Dietary needs: included on every plan, including Free.
• Printable place cards: a one-time $10 add-on per event on Free or Unlimited Guests, and included at no extra cost with RSVP & Invitations ($60 one-time per event).

There's no subscription. Every payment is one-time, per event.

The short version

Collect dietary needs once, on the RSVP or in your guest spreadsheet. Export them for the caterer. Print them on place cards for the servers. Because all three come from the same guest list you're seating, a change in one place shows up everywhere, and the guest-facing seating plan never shows any of it.