My neighbor wants juicy couture purse cake needs to feed approximately 8 people dont have a clue as to how much a cake like this would cost she needs it by 5/22. any suggestions?

I wouldnt make a purse cake for 8 servings.

It wouldnt be worth the time that would go into the detail unless you over charge tremendously.

Being that you are friendly with this person, from experience, I know that over charging probably wont happen.

any carved cake should have a base price, no matter how many it needs to feed.

let me give you an example...
a gal emailed me saying "i want to get a cake for my boyfriend's birthday...he loves lambourghini's and i want a cake that looks just like one...it only needs to feed the two of us and i'm interested in your price?!"

on my website it clearly states..."any carved cake starts at $100 whether you need to feed 2 or 200" for customer's just like this!

just b/c they need to feed a small amount of people doesn't mean that they get a small price! this juicy cake is going to take anyone at minimum 4-6 hours, from the mixing to the baking to the cooling, to the stacking, to the carving, to the crumb coat and chilling, to the fondant, to the gumpaste bow, to the juicy logo (which is complicated!), to the handle, etc., to the delivery...you get my drift!

what do you want your "hourly rate" to be?! charge her accordingly.

but personally, if it were me, i wouldn't do it for less than what i wanted to make on the cake

Thank you all for the wonderful advice.. Well I'm glad I didn't end up doing this cake. I told her I'd do it for $60( I know I even thought I was out of my mind) and I guess she felt it was too much because never called me back.

great! let her think it's too much, b/c i'll promise you that for $60, you would have made very little on that cake. by the time you took out ingredients, materials, utilities, fuel, wear and tear on your car, appliances, cake pans, etc....you would have made a few bucks per hour on labor. do you want to work for $4/hour? heck no...no one does! i wouldn't turn on my oven for $60!!! just remember that you get to set the price...if people don't like it, fine! they are the customer you want anyways.

plus, i saw your coach cake...it was good! how long did it take you to do it? i know it was for you sister, so it was a gift. but how long did it take you from start to finish? and whether the purse cake needs to feed 8 or 48, it still will take roughly the same amount of time to decorate, give or take a few hours. just keep your "hourly rate goal" in the back of your mind when quoting, but don't forget to add in all of your costs HTH

Thanks UpAt2am,
For the great advice...the coach purse took me about 10-12 hrs total time. I am not a fast worker when it comes to cakes, plus I don't make them often. I normally do cakes for family since I'm still learning. I'm so useto them paying for supplies... So when she asked I didn't have a clue as to how much to charge. I've been learning alot here on CC.
Thanks again,
Elisa