Most people who find us are searching for a machine to rent. That is exactly what we do. There is one difference, and it matters more than it sounds: we bring it to you, and we come back for it.
Delivery to your venue. Setup wherever you want the machine, plugged in and brought down to temperature. A two-minute handover — how to pull the handle, how to top it up. Collection afterwards. Cleaning, at our place rather than yours. And everything that goes in and on it: mix in the right quantity and the right formulation, toppings in bulk, cups, cones and spoons.
Nobody from our team has to stay. Once the machine is running and one person in your group knows how to work it, the rest of the event is yours. Guests serve themselves, which is most of the appeal — a self-serve bar is something people gather around rather than queue at.
If you would rather not think about it at all, an attendant is an add-on and runs the bar for you. It is an option, not a requirement.
We do not release machines for customers to pick up and transport. That is a policy rather than a scheduling problem, and it is the question we field most often from people comparing us against a dry-hire company.
Two reasons, and the first one is simply weight.
Our smaller machines weigh about 250 pounds. The full-size ones are closer to 400. Both sit on carts that add another hundred on top. So what you would actually be collecting is somewhere between 350 and 500 pounds of equipment, in and out of a vehicle, twice, with a tipping hazard the whole way. We have the gear and the practice for that. A borrowed truck and a willing friend is how people hurt their backs.
We would rather carry that risk ourselves than hand it to you. It adds a little to the cost, and we think it is a bargain against the time, the effort and the next morning.
The second reason is cleaning.
Most rental companies that let you collect a machine also require you to strip, clean and sanitize it before you return it — barrels, seals, draw valves, all of it, not a rinse. We do that ourselves, deliberately, because we want it done properly. We have rented machines from other companies over the years and more than one of them did not arrive smelling clean, which tells you the sanitizing was either rushed or not really understood. It is not a quick job and it is not an obvious one. Doing it correctly is part of what you are paying us for, and it is the part you will never have to see.
A dry hire hands you a machine and a deadline. Everything else is yours to work out, and that list is longer than most people expect.
Where do you buy soft serve mix, and which one? How much of it, for the number of people you have invited? Where does a private individual buy toppings in bulk — not a few jars, enough for two hundred people? Who is collecting the machine, and when, and who is taking it back afterwards? And then the question that actually decides whether the evening works: will the machine you booked keep up with the party you are throwing?
That last one is the one we hear about afterwards, and we have heard it more than once. A family rents a machine for a wedding and finds out during the reception that it cannot keep pace with their guest count, so the line stops moving and the dessert everyone was looking forward to becomes the thing that ran out. Or nobody mentioned that the machine had to be stripped and sanitized before it went back, and that lands at eleven at night with the reception over and the family still in their good clothes. Or somebody hurt themselves getting it into a van.
None of those are the machine’s fault. They are what happens when the person renting it is expected to be the expert.
The machine that fits the party, not the machine that happened to be free. We size it to your guest count and your serving window, because those two numbers together are what decide whether a line moves or stalls. One machine comfortably covers about 200 guests across a two to three hour window — but two hundred people in forty-five minutes, because you have a send-off at nine, is a different job and probably a second machine. We would rather tell you that before you book than have you discover it at the reception.
Power we have already checked. Our full-size machines run on 240 volt power, the kind of outlet an electric dryer uses. The smaller ones run from an ordinary 120 volt household socket, which is what most venues and nearly every backyard can offer. Which one your room needs is our problem to solve, not yours. We have worked more than seventy venues across Utah and Salt Lake counties and we keep notes on where the outlets actually are and what they will carry — the whole thing is written up here. Where a building genuinely cannot carry the load, we bring a generator. If we have not been to your venue before, we ask the right questions ahead of the day rather than find out the answer on it.
Everything that goes with it. Mix, in the right amount and the right formulation. Toppings in bulk. Cups, cones, spoons. The machine delivered, set up, cold and pouring before your first guest arrives, then collected and cleaned properly somewhere you never have to see.
Your whole job on the day is to point at the spot where it goes.
You cannot pour mix in and start serving. The machine has to bring the whole barrel down to temperature first, and that takes roughly an hour. It is why we show up about an hour before you want to be serving — that hour is the machine, not padding. Plan for us to be setting up while guests are still at dinner.
Packages run $2.10 to $3.50 a head, with a $450 minimum on every event. Delivery is included anywhere within 25 miles of our base in Lehi; beyond that it is $5.50 a mile.
If you would rather supply the dessert yourself, the machine on its own is $385. That covers the rental, the delivery, the setup, the collection and the cleaning — everything above except the dessert. Mix, toppings and serving ware would be yours to source.
Worth saying plainly, because plenty of caterers in Utah do not, and a fair share of what we do — open houses, farewells, homecomings — falls on one.
We are not, and we would rather say so than let you find out. A dry hire will cost less money. What the difference buys you is that not one of the questions above becomes yours to answer, and that the dessert works on the night.
Tell us your date and rough guest count and we will tell you which machine we would bring and what it would cost. No deposit, no commitment.
