Thanksgiving Planner Spreadsheet Template Excel Google Sheets | Holiday Dinner Hosting, Guest List, Menu and Cost Per Person Calculator

THE PART NOBODY WARNS YOU ABOUT

🎁 FREE BONUS INCLUDED — Menu + Cooking Timeline Planner (a $14 value): maps every dish to a cooking time so nothing runs late on the day. Yours free with this template.

It is not the cooking. It is that the turkey needs 325 and the rolls need 375 and both have to be out at four o'clock — and you find that out at ten past three, with fourteen people in your kitchen.

This is the spreadsheet that catches it on the Saturday before.

Tell it your serving time and how many dishes fit in your oven. It works backwards from there, tells you exactly when everything goes in, and flags every moment two dishes want the oven at once at different temperatures. In the worked example it catches 3 temperature clashes and 5 moments the oven is asked to hold more than it can.

It also answers the question you actually keep asking: what is this costing me per person?


WHAT YOU GET

11 tabs. 1,531 live formulas. One file that does the arithmetic so you can stop doing it on the back of an envelope.

- START HERE - how it works, what every flag means, and the two-click steps to open it in Google Sheets
- DASHBOARD - headcount, budget, cost per guest, oven clashes, and a planning countdown that keys off your event date
- GUEST LIST - RSVPs, adults and kids counted separately, dietary needs, allergy severity, arrival times and table numbers
- MENU BUILDER - every dish, who is bringing it, whether it is confirmed, and whether each course actually covers the room
- COST PER HEAD - the real number, split by category, plus a reverse solver
- SHOPPING LIST - rescales your recipe quantities to the guests who actually said yes
- COOKING TIMELINE - the oven-conflict planner, worked backwards from your serving time
- SEATING PLAN - tables, seats and the kids' table, with over-full tables flagged in red
- RENTALS AND DECOR - own, borrow, buy or rent, with return-by dates
- OTHER EVENTS - reuse the same file for Christmas dinner, New Year's Eve and Easter
- POST-EVENT NOTES - what ran out, what nobody touched, what to change next year


THE THREE THINGS THAT MAKE IT DIFFERENT

1. THE OVEN-CONFLICT TIMELINE
Enter a cook time and a rest time for each dish. It calculates when everything goes in, how many dishes are in the oven at any moment, and flags TEMP CLASH the second two dishes need different temperatures in the same window. No other hosting planner does this.

2. COST PER HEAD, SOLVED IN BOTH DIRECTIONS
Forwards: what this meal costs per guest, broken down across food, drink, decor, rentals, serveware and supplies. Backwards: tell it what you can spend and it tells you how many people you can feed. There is a scenario table too, so you can see what happens if four more people say yes.

3. A SHOPPING LIST THAT SCALES ITSELF
Your recipe is written for eight and you are serving 23. Enter the quantity as written, and the Scaled Qty column does the maths on every line - including working out the size of bird you actually need.


HOW IT WORKS

1. Open the Dashboard and enter your event name, date, serving time, budget and oven capacity
2. Add your guests. Only a "Yes" counts toward your headcount, so a maybe never inflates your budget
3. List your dishes and mark who is bringing what
4. Fill in the shopping list - it rescales to your headcount automatically
5. Enter cook and rest times on the timeline and let it find the clashes
6. Everything else - totals, cost per guest, seating, coverage - updates itself


HONEST ABOUT WHAT THIS IS

Every peach-shaded cell is yours to edit. Everything else is a formula and is locked so a stray click cannot break the maths - there is no password, so you can unprotect any sheet whenever you like.

The file ships filled with a complete worked example: a Thanksgiving dinner for 23 confirmed guests across 16 households, 18 dishes, and a real cost of 28.17 per person. You can see every formula working before you type a thing. Clear the example and it all re-derives from your own numbers.


COMPATIBILITY

Works in Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, Apple Numbers, LibreOffice Calc and WPS Office. No macros, no add-ons, no subscription, nothing to install. To use it in Google Sheets: File - Import - Upload - Replace spreadsheet.

Works on Windows and Mac. Best used on a desktop; viewable on mobile.


WHAT YOU RECEIVE

An instant digital download. One .xlsx file, yours to keep and reuse every year. Nothing is shipped.


A NOTE

Cost figures are your own entries. Nothing here is financial or food-safety advice - always follow current safe cooking-temperature and allergen guidance for the dishes you serve.


QUESTIONS OR WANT A TAB ADDED?

Message ReadySheetGo through Etsy. Free customisation requests are genuinely welcome - if you need a column that is not there, ask and we will add it.

ReadySheetGo - spreadsheets that actually do the work.

📗 HOW TO OPEN IN GOOGLE SHEETS (free & easy):
This is one file that works in BOTH Excel and Google Sheets — there's no separate file to find, you just import the download once:
1. Go to sheets.google.com and open a blank spreadsheet
2. Click File ▸ Import ▸ Upload
3. Drag in the .xlsx file you downloaded from this order
4. Choose "Replace spreadsheet" and click Import data
All tabs load as a full Google Sheet saved in your Drive — edit it on any device. (Prefer Excel? Just double-click the file to open.)

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VIDEO TUTORIAL INCLUDED
This template comes with a step-by-step video walkthrough to help you get set up in minutes. Your tutorial link is included with the instant download.