I have so much trouble stacking my cakes!! I use dowels or straws, and they work fine. I don't push them all the way down and put the cake on them and let it settle all the way down. But I never seem to be able to get the cake centered - it's usually off center. Any helpful suggestions are welcome. Oh, and I use buttercream icing. That's another problem - picking it up to stack. It is always messy around the bottom. HELP PLEASE........

Take a look on youtube. Edna has a really good video on how to stack and she used buttercream as well.

Hope that helps!

If your buttercream has frosted well, you can use the tip of your spatula to sort of push the top layer around in small ammounts until it's centered, as long as you've done your best to center it first.

I have also used a cake circle the size of the smaller tier, centered it--because it's light enough--and marked a guide in my icing (that will be covered up by the border) for when I place the top layer.

I use wooden dowells,leave abot 2 inches sticking up out of the bottom cake.I use the handle of a kitchen spoon to slide the cake to the edge of the counter until I can slide it off into my hands,so that there is minimal damage to the bottom edge of the cake. I also stack my cakes on a low table so I can lean directly above it and get it centered pretty good before I set it on the lower cake.
You can also measure andlightly press your upper cake board into the lower cake top.and then set your upper cake down opnto your pressed guide.
these 2 things help me...hope they help you.

Have you considered using SPS. Once the support is centered, the cake has to be centered also. And you can slide the cake into place.

Thanks for the help everyone. I have watched Edna's tutorial on u-tube, I've marked the cake with a circle. I think my problem is the counter height. Maybe I'll try the lower table to stack my cake. Or just start using the SPS. That seems to be the solution to a lot of problems I've read about on this site, including delivery. So thanks again!