Hello,

I'm starting to take my pricing more seriously, being sure to charge fairly. Most people charge my the slice. Do you think that's best? or should I charge for Groceries and Labor? I charge 7.50 per hour. Is that fair?

Thanks! :) 

Most decorator's that I have seen charge by the slice, I don't do cakes, but that seems to be how a lot of them do it. DEFINITELY charge for labor, that is tlone of the biggest aspects of decorating a cake. $7.50/hr is incredibly low so no, that part isn't fair to you. I have a friend that does cakes and she charges no less than $15.00/hr. 

I agree with ypierce - shoot for a higher hourly rate.  The per slice rate should accomodate a good hourly rate + expenses + some profit above that.

Thanks, everyone. :) I've secured my way of pricing! ^_^ No longer, am I gonna let people make me feel bad. I know my products worth, and have to keep things fair. Especially, if I'm gonna be taking this work seriously.....

I charge at least $30 an hour, and I have a friend who owns a couple of bakeries who charges $100 an hour if she gets involved in the decorating of the cakes. My daughter works as a cashier at Kroger and makes $9.75 an hour, so yeah, $7.50 is too low. That's only the wages part of your pricing, too, you also have to allow for expenses, materials and profit.

I wrote an article for American cake Decorating about pricing cakes, and I just got the proof a couple of days ago (It's going to be in the next issue.) It makes me sound like a big old meany pants dream crusher, which is good because that means that if people follow the formula (which is a lot of work to figure out at first) their pricing will be fair to them. So... Annual expenses+ materials costs+wages+profit.