Paying for Food/Drink

[BigNads79]

I host a bi-weekly 10c/20c NL game and I am looking to expand to also hosting a 25c/50c game. Since I always host, my issue is with providing food and drink.

At first, I was providing pizza and beer and charging people if they ate/drank. I was losing money and so I cut out the pizza and just got beer, but I am still losing money. It is not a lot of money, but since the stakes are so low, I feel it is an issue. It is also significant because I am not playing with a group of good friends, there are often quite a few randoms in my games and why should I buy randoms beer? The problem is basically that no matter how many people buy in for beer, we drink all the beer. If everyone wants to drink and pays, I recoup my money... if only a few do, the same amount of beer is drunk, but I end up paying for a lot of it. My goal is not to make money here (although I feel like I have a small right to, as I always host and I provide all the equipment), I just want to break even.

Does anyone have any suggestions? I feel my options are these:

1) Don't provide any food or drink (not really preferable because I have been, I will look cheap and I like to drink when I play)

2) Charge more for the people that do drink

3) Charge a flat fee to everyone who shows up and provide snacks and non-beer beverages (I don't really want to have a rake, because it is complicated at low stakes and slows play).