If you want to rent a keg – or several kegs – for an event you’re organising there are three essentials that you need to lock down before you make your booking for keg equipment hire. Get these sorted early, and your whole planning process will be much simpler.

How many people are you entertaining?

This is your starting point, because the number of people expected at your event will dictate the size of keg you need. 

Many people who haven’t worked in bars are unaware that kegs come in a variety of sizes. The smallest kegs we hire are 30 litres, but we also offer 50 litre and even 100 litre kegs to cater for groups of all sizes. 

That’s all well and good, but how many pints is that? Well, we’d expect a 30 litre keg to provide just over 50 pints, while a 100 litre keg will give you around 175 pints. 

Consider how many pints each person is likely to drink too – allowing two to three pints per person is advisable – although not everyone will necessarily be drinking the same draft. 

What drink(s) do you want on tap?

When people hear “keg” they automatically think “beer” or “lager”, but you can also hire kegs of cider, or even wine. This means you can cater to a variety of tastes easily. 

If you know that your guests will want different drinks behind the bar, you might decide it’s best to order a selection of drinks in small kegs – for example, one of lager, one ale and one wine. 

Depending on why you’re hiring a keg, you could even do a quick poll to find out what people would prefer to drink so that you’re not left with excess stock at the end of your event.

What kind of taps do you want?

This is the fun part of keg hire, because you can create a proper bar with the right kind of taps attached to your keg. But there are also simple options if you want to keep your costs down.

For instance, the lowest cost tap is a plastic cask tap that sits at the end of the barrel. It’s not quite as glamorous as a bar-mounted tap, but it gets the job done. Otherwise, you have the choice of various standard bar taps.

These come in both double and single varieties and, if Guinness is one of your drinks of choice, you could even get a branded Guinness tap to really stand out.