christmas-package

---
name: christmas-package
description: Turns your kitchen's real capacity into a festive package you can sell from September: a menu the kitchen can repeat, one total price that includes every charge the customer must pay, a written service charge position, the allergen and calorie answers settled before printing, and a one page sell sheet dated and ready to send. Use in August or September when you know Christmas is coming and nothing is written down yet.
---

# A festive menu priced, printed and on sale in September, with every charge already in the headline price

You give this your trading dates, your covers, your supplier prices and last year's Christmas menu if you have one. You get back a festive package built around what your kitchen can actually repeat: the menu, one total price per head with every compulsory charge inside it, the service charge position in writing, the allergen answer, a decision on whether calorie labelling catches you, descriptions that survive a trading standards read, and a one page sell sheet. It will not tell you what to charge. It prices the package you describe against the costs you supply, and it refuses to invent a December uplift figure, because no published figure exists for a single independent venue.

## What it does

1. **Fix the trading dates and the real cover count before designing a single dish.** Write the first and last day the festive menu runs, the days you are closed, the sittings per day, and the number of covers each sitting can serve at the pace a festive table actually eats, which is slower than a Tuesday. Multiply it out. That number is the ceiling on everything that follows, and it is the number that decides whether a dish is worth putting on. A menu designed before the cover count is a menu designed for an imaginary kitchen. Do this in August or the first week of September, because the enquiries that convert are the ones answered in the week the enquiry arrives.

2. **Build the menu from what the kitchen can repeat at volume, then cost every line against a real invoice.** Three choices per course is usually the most a small kitchen can hold at a festive pace. For each dish, write the portion weight, the supplier, the price on the most recent invoice with its date, and the yield after trim. Add a line for the things that always get forgotten: bread, butter, garnish, the cracker, the sauce nobody charges for. The output is a cost per head per menu, from documents you can open, not from memory. A dish nobody has costed is a dish whose margin is a guess, and at 300 covers a guess of 80 pence is 240 pounds.

3. **Price it as one total the customer will actually pay, with every compulsory charge inside that number.** CAP Code rule 3.18 is unambiguous: "Quoted prices must include non-optional taxes, duties, fees and charges that apply to all or most buyers." The CMA's price transparency guidance says the same for the sale itself: "In the invitation to purchase, you must give the customer the total price of the product", "The total price should normally include any unavoidable or 'mandatory' charges", and "A charge is mandatory if the customer must pay it to buy the product." A per booking fee is caught explicitly: "Include mandatory per-transaction charges in the total price of the product, even in early-stage advertising." So a 45 pound menu with a compulsory 10 percent charge and a 2 pound booking fee is not a 45 pound menu.

4. **Settle the service charge position now, in writing, before a single booking is taken.** If the charge is discretionary it stays outside the headline price and must be genuinely refusable. If it is compulsory it goes inside the headline price under step 3. Either way the money is caught by the Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023, which requires an employer to "ensure that the total amount of the qualifying tips, gratuities and service charges paid at, or otherwise attributable to, a place of business of the employer is allocated fairly between workers". The statutory Code of Practice sets the deadline: "employers must ensure that all tips are distributed to staff, at the latest, by the end of the month following the month in which the tips are paid by customers". December tips are therefore due by the end of January, which is the month you have least cash. Write that into the January plan on the day you set the price.

5. **Write the allergen answer before the menu goes to the printer, not after the first booking.** The 14 allergens that must be declared are celery, cereals containing gluten, crustaceans, eggs, fish, lupin, milk, molluscs, mustard, peanuts, sesame, soybeans, sulphur dioxide and sulphites above ten parts per million, and tree nuts. For food served loose the rule is plain: "If you provide non-prepacked foods, you must supply allergen information for every item that contains any of the 14 allergens." Information may be given orally provided there is "a written notice placed in a clearly visible position explaining how your customers can obtain this information". Build the matrix as you cost the dishes in step 2, because that is the only moment the actual ingredients are in front of you.

6. **Check whether calorie labelling catches you, and notice that a festive menu is exactly long enough to be caught.** The Calorie Labelling (Out of Home Sector) (England) Regulations 2021 apply where "on the first day of that financial year the business has 250 or more employees", counted by headcount with part time staff included. Most independent venues are outside it. The trap is the exemption, which covers food "included on a menu for less than (i) 30 consecutive days, and (ii) a total of 30 days in any calendar year". A menu running from mid November to New Year's Eve is over 30 consecutive days and the exemption is gone. A qualifying business must show the calories at the point of choice with the statement "adults need around 2000 kcal a day". Failure to comply with an improvement notice can attract a fixed monetary penalty of 2,500 pounds. Record which side of the threshold you are on and why.

7. **Write the descriptions so every word survives someone checking it.** Article 7 of Regulation 1169/2011 requires food information not to mislead "as to the characteristics of the food and, in particular, as to its nature, identity, properties, composition... method of manufacture or production", and applies the same test "to advertising" and to presentation. CAP Code rule 3.7 adds the evidence burden: "Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove claims that consumers are likely to regard as objective and that are capable of objective substantiation." So homemade, local, hand dived, dry aged, free range and Yorkshire each need a document in a drawer with a date on it. Strike any word you cannot evidence today and write the plain one instead, which reads better anyway.

8. **Publish only what you can genuinely supply, and say what runs out.** CAP Code rule 3.28 requires that marketing which quotes a price "must disclose if the marketer has any reasonable grounds for believing that it will not be possible to supply the advertised (or an equivalent) product at the advertised price within a reasonable period and in reasonable quantities". If the 45 pound menu is available on twelve dates and the 60 pound menu on four, say so on the sell sheet next to each price. This is also the commercially correct move: a published constraint is the only honest scarcity, and it is the one that survives being checked in January.

9. **Produce the one page sell sheet and the enquiry path, and date the whole thing.** One side of A4: the dates, the two or three package prices as total prices, what is included, the deposit terms by reference to the written terms rather than restated loosely, the allergen line, the service charge line, and one named person with one phone number and one email address. Under it, the internal page: cost per head, gross margin per package, the cover ceiling from step 1, and the break even number of covers. Put the build date and the date each price was read from an invoice in the footer. An undated festive costing gets reused next September against this year's supplier prices, and that is how a package quietly loses four pounds a head.

## Then it checks

1. Every package price shown to a customer includes every charge the customer cannot decline, and any charge shown outside it is named and is genuinely optional.
2. Every dish on the menu has a costed line naming a supplier, an invoice price and the date of that invoice, and no line reads "as last year" or "approx".
3. The allergen matrix covers every dish on every package menu against all 14 allergens, and the written notice wording for oral provision is drafted and placed.
4. The file states whether the business had 250 or more employees on the first day of the financial year, states how many consecutive days the festive menu runs, and reaches a stated conclusion on calorie labelling from those two facts.
5. Every adjective in every dish description is either plain and unfalsifiable or is matched to a named evidence document with a date.
6. The total covers offered across all published dates does not exceed the cover ceiling calculated in step 1, and any package with limited availability says on the sell sheet which dates it is available on.

Any check fails: name it, redo that step once. Failed twice: say what is wrong and stop.

## Rules
- Public information only.
- Never invent a fact, a number or a quote.
- Anything sent in someone's name says whose name it is.
- Never state a December uplift, a festive conversion rate, an average spend per head or a typical Christmas booking window. No published figure exists for a single independent UK venue, the numbers that circulate come from suppliers selling booking software, and an owner who prices against a borrowed figure will read a good December as a failure.
- Never set the price. The skill costs the package the owner describes and shows the margin at each price the owner considers. Choosing the number is the owner's decision and it depends on things no document holds, including who else in the town is open and what they charged last year.
- Never show a price to a customer with a compulsory charge added later. A headline that grows on the confirmation email is the practice the CMA guidance names, and it is the fastest way to turn a corporate booker into a complaint.
- Never carry a menu description forward from last year without re-reading the evidence behind it. A supplier changes, and the word "Yorkshire" on a printed menu outlives the farm it referred to.
- Never put a dish on the festive menu that has not been cooked at volume at least once. A dish that works at four covers and fails at forty takes the whole service with it, and December has no spare evenings to recover in.
- This output is a working document prepared for the owner to check against their own invoices, their accountant on VAT and margin, their environmental health officer on allergens, and their solicitor or trade body on any claim in the copy. It applies published rules to a draft package. It is not legal advice, it is not a food safety verification and it is not a ruling that the menu or the pricing complies.

## Built from
- Committee of Advertising Practice, CAP Code (Edition 12), Section 3 "Misleading advertising", https://www.asa.org.uk/type/non_broadcast/code_section/03.html, no publication date shown on the page, read 16 September 2026: rule 3.18 on non-optional charges in step 3, rule 3.7 on substantiation in step 7, and rule 3.28 on availability in step 8.
- Competition and Markets Authority, "Providing clear and accurate information about prices: summary" (CMA209), https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/price-transparency-cma209/providing-clear-and-accurate-information-about-prices-summary, updated 7 January 2026, read 16 September 2026: the total price requirement, the definition of a mandatory charge and the treatment of per transaction booking fees, all in step 3.
- Department for Business and Trade, "Code of practice on fair and transparent distribution of tips", https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/distributing-tips-fairly-statutory-code-of-practice/code-of-practice-on-fair-and-transparent-distribution-of-tips-html-version, published 29 July 2024, in force 1 October 2024, read 16 September 2026: the end of the following month payment deadline in step 4.
- Employment Rights Act 1996, section 27D, as inserted by the Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023, https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1996/18/section/27D, read 16 September 2026: the fair allocation duty quoted in step 4.
- Food Standards Agency and GOV.UK, "Allergen guidance for food businesses", https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/allergen-guidance-for-food-businesses/allergen-guidance-for-food-businesses, last updated 17 July 2026, read 16 September 2026: the 14 allergens, the non-prepacked duty and the written notice requirement in step 5.
- The Calorie Labelling (Out of Home Sector) (England) Regulations 2021, SI 2021/909, regulations 4(2)(b), 5(2)(c) and 7(1), https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2021/909/body/made, read 16 September 2026: the 250 employee test, the 30 day exemption and the 2000 kcal statement in step 6.
- Department of Health and Social Care, "Calorie labelling in the out of home sector: implementation guidance", https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/calorie-labelling-in-the-out-of-home-sector/calorie-labelling-in-the-out-of-home-sector-implementation-guidance, published 17 September 2021, read 16 September 2026: part time staff counted in the headcount, the 6 April 2022 commencement and the 2,500 pound fixed monetary penalty in step 6.
- Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 on the provision of food information to consumers, Article 7, as it applies in the UK, https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eur/2011/1169/article/7, read 16 September 2026: the fair information practices test applied to menu descriptions and advertising in step 7.

# christmas-package

## You are given
The festive trading calendar for one UK hospitality business: the first and last day the festive menu runs, the days the venue is closed, the sittings per day and the covers each sitting can serve. The draft festive menus, one per package, each with its courses and dish names exactly as they will be printed. For every dish, the portion specification and the supplier invoice lines behind it, each with a supplier name, a unit price, a unit size and an invoice date. The package prices the owner is considering, and for each one a statement of every charge a customer may be asked to pay, marked by the owner as compulsory or optional. The owner's decision on whether the service charge is discretionary or compulsory. The owner's statement of headcount on the first day of the current financial year. The evidence documents behind any claim in a dish description, such as a supplier certificate, a breed or provenance declaration or a farm invoice. Last year's festive menu and costings where they exist. All judgement calls, including the final price, the menu selection and the service charge position, have already been made by the owner and are supplied to you.

## Produce
Write into a `./christmas-package-output/` folder:

1. `capacity.csv` with these columns in this order: `date`, `day_of_week`, `open`, `sitting_ref`, `sitting_start`, `sitting_end`, `covers_available`, `packages_offered`, `notes`. `open` is `yes` or `no`. One row per sitting per date across the whole festive run. A `TOTAL` row carries the sum of `covers_available`, which is the cover ceiling.
2. `dish-costings.csv` with columns: `dish_ref`, `package_ref`, `course`, `dish_name_verbatim`, `component`, `supplier`, `invoice_date`, `invoice_unit_price_gbp`, `unit_size`, `portion_quantity`, `yield_percent`, `component_cost_gbp`, `costing_source`. `dish_ref` is D001 upward. `course` is exactly one of `starter`, `main`, `dessert`, `side`, `extra`. `costing_source` is exactly one of `supplier invoice supplied`, `price list supplied`, `no document supplied`. Every row with `no document supplied` is listed in `gaps.md` and its `component_cost_gbp` is left empty, never estimated.
3. `package-pricing.csv` with columns: `package_ref`, `package_name_verbatim`, `cost_per_head_gbp`, `headline_price_supplied_gbp`, `charge_name`, `charge_amount_gbp`, `charge_basis`, `compulsory`, `inside_headline_price`, `total_price_payable_gbp`, `gross_margin_gbp`, `gross_margin_percent`, `breakeven_covers`. `charge_basis` is exactly one of `per head`, `per booking`, `percentage of bill`. `compulsory` and `inside_headline_price` are `yes` or `no`. Any row where `compulsory` is `yes` and `inside_headline_price` is `no` is listed in `gaps.md` as a price transparency failure.
4. `allergen-matrix.csv` with columns: `dish_ref`, `dish_name_verbatim`, then one column per allergen in this exact order: `celery`, `cereals_containing_gluten`, `crustaceans`, `eggs`, `fish`, `lupin`, `milk`, `molluscs`, `mustard`, `peanuts`, `sesame`, `soybeans`, `sulphur_dioxide_and_sulphites`, `tree_nuts`, then `source_of_declaration`, `declared_by`, `date_declared`. Each allergen cell is exactly `present`, `absent` or `not stated`. Every `not stated` cell is counted in `gaps.md`.
5. `claims-in-descriptions.csv` with columns: `dish_ref`, `word_or_phrase_verbatim`, `claim_type`, `evidence_document_supplied`, `evidence_file_name`, `evidence_date`, `substantiated`. `claim_type` is exactly one of `provenance`, `method of production`, `breed or variety`, `freshness`, `homemade or handmade`, `welfare`, `superlative`, `award or accolade`, `plain description`. `substantiated` is `yes` or `no`. Rows marked `plain description` need no evidence.
6. `calorie-labelling-test.md` recording, on separate lines and nothing else: the headcount supplied and the date it refers to; whether that is 250 or more; the first and last date of the festive menu; the number of consecutive days between them; whether that number is 30 or more; and the resulting conclusion stated as `in scope`, `out of scope on headcount` or `out of scope on the 30 day exemption`. Every line names where the figure came from.
7. `sell-sheet-facts.csv` with columns: `package_ref`, `total_price_payable_gbp`, `dates_available`, `covers_remaining`, `included_verbatim`, `service_charge_line_verbatim`, `allergen_line_verbatim`, `contact_name`, `contact_phone`, `contact_email`. Every text field is copied verbatim from the owner's supplied wording.
8. `gaps.md` a numbered list of: every dish component with no supplied document; every allergen cell reading `not stated`; every compulsory charge sitting outside the headline price; every description claim with no evidence document; every package whose published covers exceed the cover ceiling; every dish with no portion specification; and any figure the owner supplied without a date.

## Rules
- Codex costs, counts, compares and records. It never sets a price, never writes or edits a dish name or a description, never decides whether a charge is compulsory, and never makes the calorie labelling judgement. Those were supplied.
- Never estimate a cost. A component with no supplied document has an empty cost cell and a line in `gaps.md`. A part costed package reports its cost per head as incomplete rather than as a number.
- Never mark an allergen `absent` from a dish name or a recipe title. Only a supplied declaration naming the person and the date supports `present` or `absent`. Everything else is `not stated`.
- Never write a December uplift, an average spend per head, a booking conversion rate or any industry benchmark into any file. No such figure exists for a single independent UK venue and none is to be recorded.
- Never carry a price, a supplier or a description forward from last year's file. Last year's figures may be recorded in a separate column for comparison and never used in a calculation.
- Never publish more covers than the `TOTAL` row of `capacity.csv`. Where the supplied dates would exceed it, the excess is recorded in `gaps.md` and no file is silently adjusted.
- Use British English, GBP written as `GBP` or the pound sign, and DD Month YYYY dates. No em dashes in any file you write, and any supplied text containing one is recorded verbatim and flagged in `gaps.md`.
- Every quoted dish name, package name and customer facing line is copied exactly, including its punctuation and capitalisation.
- Every file ends with this line: this is a working document prepared for the owner to check against their own invoices, and for their accountant, environmental health officer and solicitor or trade body to check before anything is printed or published. It applies supplied rules to a draft package and is not a ruling that the menu or the pricing complies.

## Return
The absolute path of every file written, the row count of each CSV, the cover ceiling from the `TOTAL` row of `capacity.csv`, the cost per head and gross margin percentage for each package or the word incomplete where a component is uncosted, the count of components with no supplied document, the count of allergen cells reading `not stated` and the dishes they sit on, the list of every compulsory charge found outside a headline price, the count of description claims with no evidence document, the conclusion recorded in `calorie-labelling-test.md` stated in full with the two figures it rests on, and the `gaps.md` item count.