Cake Decorating Community - Cakes We Bake

Over the weekend I made a stack of books cake for someone I work with. It was three 9x13 cakes covered in fondant and stacked. I also hand cut all the details to the cake. It went with a 3d Dr. Seuss smash cake that was 7" tall covered in fondant. I heard someone complain about the cost, but I don't think I charged that much. Can anyone tell me what you would have charged for it?

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I used a pricing matrix I downloaded a while back. Assuming you paid yourself $10.00 per hour and the cake only took you 9.5 hours (I know this is WAY under what you SHOULD be charging) and I modified the matrix to fit costs in my area. Also this allots for no profit margin, I came up with $230.00, now realistically, $350.00 is more like what I would charge in my matrix. I am not a licensed baker, I only bake for friends and family but I do like to know what my cakes could be worth if I ever get licensed. In my matrix I have no over-head. Now if I was really charging for cakes, all of this would increase significantly. Out of curiosity, what did you charge?

I only charged him $120 for both cakes. I calculated what I spent on supplies and a small amount for my time. Here is a picture of the cakes together.

Hopefully you can see it.

 

Those are beautiful! I'm a huge Dr. Seuss fan as well. But seriously, you did NOT over charge. If anything you under charged. The matrix I use is stripped down, no overhead, no profit margin, just cost of ingredients and time (I don't charge, but often put in my info to see what I could charge). I feel you could have very very reasonably charged $200. But you deserve much more. I live in an area that is just starting to buy custom cakes so I probably would have charged $150, but someone complaining about $120?! That is absurd! Your cake is awesome. Worth every penny... My matrix says so :)
Thank you Jackie : ) I feel a little better after talking with a fellow decorator. Are you able to send me a link to the pricing matrix, or have the website?

Your cake is beautiful.  I have the same problem as well with pricing, but Jackie is right, you could of charged more.  The one thing I learned in my business class from my professor is, If the customer complains about your price, then they will not be your customer.  There are plenty of customers that will pay the price.

People have no clue the amount of time it takes to produce something like this.  Some don't even bake so they have no idea the cost involved.  They only see cheap cakes at places like Walmart, Costco, BJ and think that is all it costs.  I bake from scratch and try to use quality products.  Sometimes when I add it all up, I am shocked how much the cake I gave as gift cost me to make.  I don't not think you overcharged.  Quite the opposite, I think you undercharged.  How I wish the cake shows on tv mentioned the price of those custom cakes.  Perhaps, people would finally get it!

Oh, absolutely. I'll send you the link when I get to my computer. I'm on my phone now.
Goreti, I completly agree. I never knew the real cost until I started keeping track as well, but I knew a custom cake was not cheap. It's art. Also, I think people see $1.68 for a box mix and think we'll, that 3 tier cake was under $5.00 to make. All the person did was decorate it, I could do that.My thought to that is "if you could have you would have."

Thank you Jackie, and thank you everyone else. I am glad I am not the only one having a problem with pricing : )

http://jasonkraftblog.wordpress.com/2013/05/14/the-magic-pricing-fo...

Here is a link to help with pricing cakes. Hope it helps.

I think you definately should have charged more for these cakes.  They are beautiful, really well done. I know how much time you put into them.  I Love them!  My 7 month old grandson has his room decorated with Dr. Seuss.  I know in 5 months I'll be making a big Dr Seuss 1st birthday cake!  But I don't think I could do anything like this. Wish I could. You should be proud of your work!!

 

Yes Penny
You certainly did undercharge. It's funny, if it is a wedding cake, you don't always get the same $$$$ question situation. But any other well decorated cake for any other occasion takes the same work, time & effort..... sometimes more. But some seem more apt to splurge on a wedding cake. If I had done this.... which I don't believe I have the skill level to have accomplished, It would have been minimum $200. It also really, really depends where you live as well as to how much you can charge. The more cosmopolitan a city, the more you can charge. I made a engagement cake & a rehearsal cake/cakes for a friend. What I did was write down all my ingredients used with prices, prep time, baking time ( which factored in use of electricity in using oven ), decorating time, labour: @$18/hr. When it is all written down too see, doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out, your not making a huge profit. Give yourself a pat on the back for a job well done. :o)

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