What To Charge For Cupcakes

Decorating By Susan94 Updated 17 Mar 2005 , 11:45pm by Ladycake

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Susan94 Posted 17 Mar 2005 , 7:54pm
post #1 of 6

I was asked to make a dozen cupcakes for someone and they want my royal icing flowers on it (that I have made up in advance). I called 3 bakeries and just for icing and sprinkles it costs, $10, or $18 or 5.99 (supermarket) and so I'm clueless of what I should charge. I would charge $10. for just icing but I will be putting my royal icing flowers on all of them. What would you charge? I'm thinking $14 a dozen? I hate not knowing the cost and don't want to lose money. I will use a boxed cake mix for these (haven't tried a scratch one yet) but make my own buttercream and flowers.

5 replies
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llj68 Posted 17 Mar 2005 , 8:20pm
post #2 of 6

Honestly, $14 sounds fine to me. However, you really need to sit down and figure out how much it costs you to make them. I recently did this with a pencil, calculator, legal pad and a trip to the grocery store and was shocked at how much cakes really cost me to make and that wasn't even including time, electricity, wear and tear on my equipment, clean up, etc.

Sadly, I didn't figure it out for cupcakes. I don't usually make them.

Good Luck!!

Lisa thumbs_up.gif

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Ladycake Posted 17 Mar 2005 , 8:43pm
post #3 of 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by Susan94

I was asked to make a dozen cupcakes for someone and they want my royal icing flowers on it (that I have made up in advance). I called 3 bakeries and just for icing and sprinkles it costs, $10, or $18 or 5.99 (supermarket) and so I'm clueless of what I should charge. I would charge $10. for just icing but I will be putting my royal icing flowers on all of them. What would you charge? I'm thinking $14 a dozen? I hate not knowing the cost and don't want to lose money. I will use a boxed cake mix for these (haven't tried a scratch one yet) but make my own buttercream and flowers.




What is your cost in this.??? What you need to do if figure out what it would cost you for one box of cake mix ect and then your frosting and then a cost per each of your flowers..

I think $14.00 is cheap and your under selling your self...

YOU need to get you a price Matrix and put the items in a chart and this way you would be able to get a price for your items.. not knowing what your flowers are mostly they should be .25 per flower. or up... I would say at least $1.00 per cup cake and then the flower for $1.25 but its up to you ...

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Susan94 Posted 17 Mar 2005 , 10:06pm
post #4 of 6

Ladycake, I knew I was under priced for it! The girl I am selling it to "doesn't make alot of money" and so I always end up being "nice" and making it cheaper than I want to because then I think they would go elsewhere because I'm too expensive. They don't realize that it costs alot of my time to make each royal icing flower and the ingredients to use for that. So I'm with you. I will charge $14 for plain ones and a little more for flowers on top (royal). I will sit down to figure the cost of ingredients soon. I should do it before baby #2 is born.

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cakeconfections Posted 17 Mar 2005 , 10:35pm
post #5 of 6

I start with 1.50 each for cupcake with just butter cream. 1.75 with a royal flower and 2 for a rose. I havent done with filling but depending on the type of filling i would charge .25 each extra. You cant really compare yourself to a grocery store, because the work that we due, while it may seem to be the same, is more detailed.

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Ladycake Posted 17 Mar 2005 , 11:45pm
post #6 of 6
Quote:
Originally Posted by Susan94

Ladycake, I knew I was under priced for it! The girl I am selling it to "doesn't make alot of money" and so I always end up being "nice" and making it cheaper than I want to because then I think they would go elsewhere because I'm too expensive.




You have to do what you have to do but you have to also at lease make back what it cost you to do it... I know you want to do them but you know what if they are going to go somewhere else then they are going to get what they paid for STALE stuff unfresh... YOU know where I am going with this...


Quote:
Quote:

I should do it before baby #2 is born.




Is this anytime soon?? LOL ...

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