What is Craft Services, and what is their Job Duty on set?
Craft services workers are responsible for the “crafts” such as grips, costume department, makeup artists, camera and lighting crew when it comes time to sit for a meal. These individuals essentially provide goods that range from bare bones essentials such as water and snacks to full on lunches and dinners for the crafts crew. Much like catering, craft services ensures that meals, drinks and snacks are provided to the crafts crew on schedule and without interruption to the existing film shooting schedule.
Craft services generally includes healthy options, junk food, snacks, and some selection of drinks that will be versatile enough to meet the demands of a wide group of film crew members.
Every craft services crew is different, providing different assortments of snacks and goods to consume or use for the crew. Much of what is provided by craft services is dictated by the budget for the film.
Higher budget films may have a larger assortment while lower budget films may stick to simple snacks and water.
Craft Services Responsibilities
Craft Services is responsible for providing snacks, coffee, refreshments, and meals to the crew and cast that is on set throughout the day. They often take part in trash maintenance throughout the day too.
Craft services range in scope based largely on the production budget. Some do coffee and snacks only. Others do high value meals that keep cast and crew full for the entire duration of the shoot. Most fall somewhere in the middle.
Based on Budget
Responsibilities of the craft services crew include keeping the assortment of drinks, dishes, snacks, and assorted foods together and visibly ready for the taking. Some will have fruit trays and vegetable platters that go out.
Others will offer dinner when the time comes and a shoot is taking up meal time. Craft services coordinates, prepares and delivers meals and snacks as well as beverages to the crew.
They may need to know how to operate hot dog makers and sandwich shop items. Some craft services crews are skilled in simple tasks like coffee production or getting waters put on ice so that there are cold drinks available following a lengthy shoot.
The idea is to ensure that the department runs on schedule, includes a variety of options to choose from, stays within budget, and keeps the rest of the film crew satisfied.
Craft Services Skills
Craft services members must have a love for pleasing people. This job is demanding, and may not offer much in the way of reward, but it is vital to the crew and members on set.
Craft services must be articulate and able to provide special attention to what people do and don’t like so that they can adjust their offering as they go. Additionally, they must be attentive and actively open to helping others.
Additional craft services skills include:
- Communication and ability to work well with others.
- Strong people-pleasing skills.
- Strong budgeting skills and ability to navigate choices in a way that will stay within budget.
- Ability to negotiate expenses for snacks and other food products for the best value.
- Strong sense of thinking ahead and planning.