But I Thought We Hit It Off, Dont I Get A Discount Now?
Decorating By twistedsplinters Updated 28 Jul 2008 , 6:13am by chutzpah
Pookie59, I totally agree! I work full time also, and I would have to be insane 
to make cake for free/discount!
Janette
Where in MI are you I live in Chesterfield. My husband worked for Ford and had to take an early retirement. Things are getting very bad here my daughter lost her home of 5 years because they could not sell it they had to let it go back to the bank. They are back on there feet now and are looking for a new home better financing this time fixed rate
New Boston. It's between Detroit and Toledeo, close to Monroe.
DH had to take an early retirement from GM, that's why we had the house up. We're not going to lose it, but we certainly had to change our lifestyle.
Our friend had to file Bankruptcy because they got hooked into that low intrest rate for 3 yrs. Then the 3 yrs was up and the house payment doubled.
I remember when the low interest rates first came out DH talked about it. I told him stop and use your head. That's not a long time and then when it's up you don't know what the rate will be, then what.
Yes, and I love the saying with "It will be good advertisement for you." Hey, I have plenty of business without "paying" for you to advertise for me.
I started my business on word of mouth and that's fine by me. It keeps out a lot of the "economy" shoppers...hope that doesn't sound rude or pompous but I mean the ones that are looking for a custom cake at a Wal-mart price. As far as advertising--I just purchased a PROFESSIONAL ad in our local wedding magazine.
I have added a pricing page to my website and lots of people call to ask what do I charge for a 1/4 sheet cake. YOU ARE ON MY WEBSITE...CAN YOU NOT LOOK??? Sorry, I don't say that to them but I'm thinking it.
I'm learning so much, that I'm not alone. I get the same thing. They are looking at my site and prices and will still ask. The last cake I did - my site says the prices are for basic decorating addtional supplies needed you will only be charged what I have to pay. The woman was shocked when I told her it was $5 more. I actually paid $10 more for what she wanted. I might have made $5. That can go toward the cost of turning my oven on.
Good for you guys! I am just starting out in this and the way I began was I got a call from my SIL asking if I would do her sister's wedding cake. I'd never done a three tiered wedding cake and the wedding was TWO WEEKS away. She said that they could pay me $75 for the work. I told her it would be fine as long as they paid for the supplies. I actually went all over town getting a list of where to get things and the price comparisons to save her money, I give her the ingredients list to pick stuff up and she says ok. I don't hear from them for days, and remember, this is like ONE WEEK away now. I get ahold of my SIL and she says, "she doesn't get paid yet, but you can buy the stuff and she will reimburse you" ? She knows I don't have money right now, I'm a student, so I said "maybe YOU can buy the ingredients and she can reimburse YOU" and she's like "Oh, I can't afford that!" Duh, neither can I! She says in 3 days she will get the ingredients. I don't hear from her and so on the 3rd day, 3 days before the wedding I connect with her and she says "oh, didn't Della tell you? We decided we couldn't afford ingredients, so we just bought a cake."
Are you kidding me?! Anyway, I was so disappointed that I didn't get to do the wedding cake that I decided I'd try to start a business! LOL!
I think I'm missing something here. It seems like you are telling us that she had money for a cake somewhere else but no money for the ingredients for your cake??????
If that's the case that must have been some nasty cake.
So I literally just got off the phone with my neice, she says her mom is mad at me because the cake i made for her brother lost a truck, it was a skateboard and the wheel fell out of the cake. I made the cake for free because she wasnt going to get a cake for him because they had no money to buy it. They took the cake from Detroit to Traverse City MI, about a 4 hour drive, it was 95 degrees and humid and I told her it might happen I should leave the trucks off and put them on right before she served it and she said she didn't want to put the trucks on just do it and she would take her chances! OHHHHHH some people!!
Yea, you're talking about a 4 hr trip on MI roads. I lost a wedding cake trying to dodge potholes.
And, how can you be mad about a free cake?
I did a baby shower cake yesterday (it's the bear on the quilt in my pics) for a friend of my sisters. She was throwing the baby shower with a few other girls. She told me to charge her regular price for the cake because she only expects me to make free cakes for her kids (which I happily do because I love my nieces and they love my cake 
). So anyways, the other girls ended up basically making my sister pay for everything for the shower because they kept having excuses as to why they couldn't stuff. So when my sister started talking to them about how much money she had spent and she mentioned the cake the one girl said I thought your sister was donating that to the baby shower. My sister was like why in the world would she donate a cake to a baby shower especially for someone she hardly knows. Don't you know how much time and money it takes to make a cake like that. If you wanted a cheap cake then you should have gone to the grocery store and gotten her a plain sheet cake. I love my sister. She said everything that I can't say to customers 
I've really only made cakes for friends or family but its weird how when people find out how much you would charge to do a cake for them they somehow justify paying the money for a Walmart cake! makes no sense to me. My one friend who is really all about referring people to me I almost always do her cakes at cost and she'll even come to my house and help mix colors and clean up too...cheap help and I so appreciated too. I made her son's barnyard cake, bridal cake (daisies) for a friend and also her co-workers cake (winnie the pooh). I just don't think people realize the time, money & sweat that goes into all the planning and the work for these nice cakes.
I get people at work constantly asking "Hey when you going to bring a cake to work?" I reply "When you order it and pay for it."
OMG! In the beginning I would bring in practice cakes. when I finally came to my senses and gave the above reply, the response was was utter shock. How could I expect them to "order" a cake when they were getting one for free. 
sheesh..... 
Since I started telling my coworkers they will get a cake when they order one and pay for it, I don't get any orders. Which is fine by me, I have more time to make cakes for paying customers or my family.
I no longer do the discount thing either. I used to but not anymore. You do it once and then it is expected by everyone.
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