Hey everyone, I'm pretty new to this and I'm still not sure how it all works and I'm also sure this topic has come up before.. I just started doing fondant cakes and selling them in June and I'm not confident in my prices, most of the time I feel like I'm selling myself short but when I try to charge more I worry it's too much! Does anyone have any advice? I'm from Connecticut too, I know where your located makes a difference in pricing. Attached are some of my cakes. 
i love your stuff -- you should price as much or more than the best aka highest priced baker in your area --
however you have a copyright issue to decide on -- copyrighted items like some of your lovely work cannot be duplicated/sold without permission --
i should put a link in here right now for more information but i don't have one -- someone will have more info or you can do some searches on here -- popular topic
best to you
Hi, Shelley. First off, you do very nice work. Maybe if you gave us sizes and what you actually charged for them, we might be able to help.
You've fallen into the same trap as so many we've seen...you got the cart before the horse. Your pricing and policies should be firmly in place before you even discuss your first order. Like in January.
If you're going to have a business, you need to treat it as such and do all the un-fun work first. Like pricing, recipes, contract, market research, etc. Of course it's not too late to get all that lined out but trying to run your business when you're still getting the basics under control just makes it that much harder on yourself.
CC provides a great learning curve and we'll help as much as we can.
Thank you @jgifford and @-K8memphis ! I know I should of had this all figured out first but I didn't even realize it happening lol, people just started asking me, I never thought people would want cakes like this so before I knew it I had all these orders and was all sorts of confused haha, right now what I do is I figured out my price of how much everything costs me for each cake, the I multiply that by three. The spider man cake was a three layer 9in and a 3 layer six inch, and I charged $200, including $30 for delivery so I guess really $170. The poker cake was $175, 3layer 10in, 2layer 8in and one layer six in round. The ghando bot I foolishly charged $100.. It was one of my first cakes, it was 20hrs of work and a lesson learned to say the least.
thank you for all the help too I really appreciate it! No one I know does what I do so no one can really help me with all my questions!
So the spider man cake was approximately 44 servings so you charged about $3.86 per serving. The poker cake was, I'm going to say, around 68 servings so you charged about $2.57 per serving. For the robot, if you paid yourself $5 per hour, then you covered everything but your time out of the goodness of your heart.
You need to add up all your costs: ingredients, equipment, boards, electricity/gas, soap, paper towels, insurance, gas for your car, shopping and planning time, etc., as well as give yourself a decent hourly wage. Determine a price per serving that covers everything since most bakers price this way.
Keep in mind what the average price is in your area and go from there.
@jgifford you're right, thank you, I'm going to figure this all out! I'll feel better about my prices then!
Hi Shelley, I'm working on all my "un-fun" stuff now too. You know the other day I got so frustrated and stressed trying to set up my pricing sheet that I actually called 3 local bakeries, pretending to be an interested party, and gave them the exact dimensions and details and # of servings I needed and they each gave me a quote. That really put it in perspective for me. I know you mentioned not many people around you do what you're doing—look to the nearest place that does what you're doing and give them a call. Hang in there, tons of people struggle with this pricing thing. We've just all got to make sure we don't short sell ourselves and our time. This is edible art—your cakes look fantastic!
Why thank you, @Sammy09 for the recommendation...
For @ShelleyMirm if you're in Connecticut you can definitely charge more than that! It depends where in CT you are, but for the most part your pricing should be on the high end of average
@jgifford thank you! @sweetmo that makes me feel a lot better that I'm not the only one struggling! I'll have to contact a few bakeries and get some ideas of everything around me. @costumeczar I'm in Milford so southern ct, in new haven county and right near Fairfield county
You can definitely charge more...If you were a little farther west I'd tell you to jack your prices up sky-high, but you can still get more than you're getting now. If the NYC commuters have made it over your way go for it!
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