How Long Should It Take? Am I A Liability?
Business By CakeInfatuation Updated 15 Oct 2009 , 9:17am by online_annie
Not trying to disagree or argue, just asking out of curiosity.
Snarkybaker everything you say makes sense. I'm not familiar how a bakery does things, only at home businesses. Just was wondering was that 8 hours for just decorating? And also, is it just one person doing the decorating or is it a few people working together on the one cake and getting it done in 8 hours? Just being nosy...
Yes that is eight hours just for decorating. It is sort of impractical to calculate labor time on baking etc, because in our ovens I can have 20 cakes baking at a time, so cake itself costs ingredients times 5. Building/decoration is anywhere from $25 to $100 per hour.
The olympian cake had three people working on it because we got the order abou 30 hours before the cake was due. We had to bust butt to get the fugures done so they had at least overnight to dry. One of them was a $7.50 hour counter helper who only worked as " surgical nurse", which doesn't cost much,but sure does speed things up. With her hours in there, we were probably at 10 hours.
I have 5 girls that work for me. 3 have pastry degrees, two have art degrees. They work in decorating teams usually, with the artist doing the first sketch and and rendering or modeling that is needed and the chef builds, stacks, covers with fondant, does piping work, makes gumpaste flowers etc.
I was asking just in case I ever get really brave and let the thought "Store Front" cross my mind. I kind of like the slow pace of an at home business. SO thanks for the info.
On another note, I believe that when the OP makes these cakes, she has no help. She does all the decorating by herself, so that probably effects the time.
I plan on teaching my husband & 14-year old some techniques so I can have slave labor (my husband) & cheap labor (my daughter). 
I was asking just in case I ever get really brave and let the thought "Store Front" cross my mind. I kind of like the slow pace of an at home business. SO thanks for the info.
On another note, I believe that when the OP makes these cakes, she has no help. She does all the decorating by herself, so that probably effects the time.
I plan on teaching my husband & 14-year old some techniques so I can have slave labor (my husband) & cheap labor (my daughter).
I'm not sure what you mean but our op is the help.
If three decorators work on a project for one hour--that's three hours of decorating. If they each work on it for 20 minutes that's one hour.
To clarify. I work alone. With NO help. Just me. I get the cake out of the freezer, and do everything by myself. I could definitely work faster if I had a team working with me. Gosh... a sheeter would be huge. And tools... I bring 80% of my tools with me because the shop isn't equipped.
There are much smarter ways to do things, but it does help if you have the necessary tools.
I was refferring to her saying it took 8 hours for them to decorate a cake with 3 people working on it. THAT is help, not her job title. Can I accomplish what 3 people can do in 8 hours, no. And if I go off how you calculate, technically, 3 decoraters working 8 hours, means it took 24 hours to decorate the cake, not the 8 she said. So then I guess that woud make the OP pretty fast doing a cake in 14 hours.
That's why Snark's qualifed it for that cake.
I can do the boat cake or the kitchen scene in several hours just like any other professional retail shop decorator.
The op is way slow not fast not close. No offense.
That's why Snark's qualifed it for that cake.
I can do the boat cake or the kitchen scene in several hours just like any other professional retail shop decorator.
The op is way slow not fast not close. No offense.
But could you do it that fast after less than a year of experience? That's where the big difference comes in here, and where I think some of you are coming down just a tad harsh. haha. She's a newbie with a tremendous talent...its like a smart 8 year old trying to make it as a freshman in high school....the genius 8 year old might be able to handle the classes but he is going to struggle with some of the extra things that come along with being a high schooler.
I'm not being harsh.
She's in a job that's currently over her head.
It's a tough gig.
No it's the home caker going into the commercial decorating world.
You guys don't seem to be quite getting it.
Ok--then the owners made the mistake in hiring someone under qualified.
There's not really an easy way to say it.
You're just prolonging the agony looking for loop holes.
She's gotta drop 2/3 or more of her current work time to survive--no matter how old or experienced. She's gotta look at a project and make a snap decision how long it's gonna take her and how to price it and communicate this to the right person.
If she was given a job performance review...
This is why a lot of bakeries will pass on the home decorator. They can't cut it. I think op can cut it and I told her so. If the owners can hold out for her she's gonna have it made. She's asking some tough questions I'm stepping up and shooting straight.
I have had my teeth kicked in more times than I'd like to recall in this line of work~~it's not for the timid.
One of the reasons I only hire people with a degree ( be it art or culinary) is that I know that they have been working under deadlines. Culinary and art students both have practical exams that require them to complete a project within specified times. They have learned to plan their time accordingly.They both also do internships where they are again put in real life situations. No one graduates from culinary school knowing what I need them to know, but they do know HOW to work, and can take instruction.
The OP NEEDS to learn 1- to move faster, and 2- to clearly and accurately communicate how much time she needs to do a project. When I went from being the only pastry chef at the restaurant to owning my own shop with a staff, I often made the mistake of charging based on how long it would take me to do a cake. We lost money on a ton of cakes. You can't do that and stay in business.
The truth of the matter is that an adequate speedy designer is worth more that an exceptional but slow one, since most people don't notice cakes little flaws. Think even about the Food network challenges...you don't finish...you lose. You finish, even if some of the detail work isn't perfect...you're in the running.
One of the reasons I only hire people with a degree ( be it art or culinary) is that I know that they have been working under deadlines. Culinary and art students both have practical exams that require them to complete a project within specified times. They have learned to plan their time accordingly.They both also do internships where they are again put in real life situations. No one graduates from culinary school knowing what I need them to know, but they do know HOW to work, and can take instruction.
The OP NEEDS to learn 1- to move faster, and 2- to clearly and accurately communicate how much time she needs to do a project. When I went from being the only pastry chef at the restaurant to owning my own shop with a staff, I often made the mistake of charging based on how long it would take me to do a cake. We lost money on a ton of cakes. You can't do that and stay in business.
The truth of the matter is that an adequate speedy designer is worth more that an exceptional but slow one, since most people don't notice cakes little flaws. Think even about the Food network challenges...you don't finish...you lose. You finish, even if some of the detail work isn't perfect...you're in the running.
I completely agree! I too work with custom cakes at a bakery, it really is all about time. Some people may not realize how long it takes to do something, but in a bakery or a restaurant environment you're constantly under the gun. Speed becomes essential.
.... but in a bakery or a restaurant environment you're constantly under the gun. Speed becomes essential.
I need to agree with all of these types of comments. Being an off-site caterer, I have to arrive, unload and have everything set up in an hour. I allocate about 10 minutes, 15 max, to set up the wedding cake. I read a thread on here once where someone said it took them 4 hours to set up a wedding cake. 
No way can I (a) afford to have someone out on a deliver run for 4 hours and (b) afford to PAY them to take 4 whole hours just to set up a cake.
I think what I'm hearing k8 and snarky saying is that now it's time to take ownership and start thinking like a business owner and not a "just a decorator". As a home decorator, the decorator rarely has to think about "real" payroll because, as I see them post frequently, "I don't have payroll ... it's just me." Over and over I have tried to instill the idea on these threads that "you ARE your payroll! You're just not actually writing the check for it."
I still say it's time to be educated .... on their end and on yours. They need educated on what is needed to make cakes like this (the time and the proper tools) and you need edcuated in how much time needs to be allocated so the bakery makes a profit.
I was refferring to her saying it took 8 hours for them to decorate a cake with 3 people working on it. THAT is help, not her job title. Can I accomplish what 3 people can do in 8 hours, no. And if I go off how you calculate, technically, 3 decoraters working 8 hours, means it took 24 hours to decorate the cake, not the 8 she said. So then I guess that woud make the OP pretty fast doing a cake in 14 hours.
Jesh..the pirate cake in that photo wouldn't take two hours of pure labor if we devoted three people to it. There is some drying time, etc. but that doesn't cost anything.
When I say hours of labor, that is the numbers of hours I pay for, so if two people are working for 4 hours, that is 8 hours of labor. Now, I don't count the counter help that I have help at slow times because it isn't reliably available ( they can only help when the front of the store is slow) and they have wildly varying levels of talent, so they are impossible to budget. I said if I added back in our " nurse" we'd be at 10 for the Olympic cake...not the pirate cake..
The math of owning a store works basically like this- You have a labor budget of about 30%, and materials budget of about 20%, an overhead budget of about 20-25%, a marketing budget of 5 to 8%, and you hope that you end up making around 20%.
So for a $250 cake, my TOTAL labor needs to be at around $75. Then you have to deduct the labor involved in the baking, the prepping of fillings and frostings etc, and of course the order taking boxing , and other administration. So lets call that $10, which is WAY low. so that leaves $65 for the decorator, including her social security, medicare, and unemployment that I have to pay, which takes about 25%, so that leaves $48.75 for the decorator, which at 14 hours is $3.48 per hour. So the OP is worth a wage of $3.48 per hour in a professional shop, and it is against the law for me to hire her for that. So to answer her original question, yes at you current speed and quality of work, you are a liability, not an asset.
I just noticed another potential problem and wanted to ask people who have storefront etc. for their opinion.
The OP says she is working 1 or 2 days a week, on special cakes only (or does gumpaste decorations for other decorators). Do you think this adds to the problem?
In my understanding, this can a part of the problem. At home (meaning a real hobby baker), you work ONE cake at time from start to finish. At bakery or even home BUSINESS where you have several orders, you can and should plan ahead - spend one or two hours or even a day doing gumpaste decorations for all the cakes in next few days, weeks or whatever. If you work ONE cake at the same time in a bakery, you loose this advantage - your specialty cake or gumpaste decorations need drying time? Fondant or buttercream needs time to firm up? Unless you can work on another part of the cake or prepare gumpaste decorations for another cake, you are loosing time. Even when not, you are loosing time switching from one kind of work to another. As much as I hate line production work, it can be an advantage to have several cakes lined out. You get higher speed automatically.
This gets partly back to the first problem - your speed. The bakery cannot take more orders, because you cannot do them in less time. But you loose productivity doing A cake. If this is the case, speak with the bakery how to manage this part better.
I can actually work on three cakes at the same time. So the amount I spend on one cake, I can also spend doing 3 cakes, go figure. But I do, do some pieces in advance. But I've also been doing this longer then the OP.
I bow down to the mathematical business geniouses on here...and if I ever do decide to open a storefront, I will be taking advantage on your wealth of knowledge in the future. 
I work at home and I work on several cakes at one time. I allocate days and schedule my time out for different jobs like gumpaste...baking....or whatever.
Indy...you bring up a point I want to ask about...delivery....now I can set up my cakes in no time. (My meringue one was kind of longer as it was SO hard to stack, etc)...if it were not for unprepared people on site!!! So many times I arrive only to find the table not prepared....or no table at all....or I have to track down someone who can tell me where the cake goes...or I have to wait around for someone to get this or that...or find the flowers I'm supposed to put on the table...etc etc etc. If I could just go in and set my cake down and add the topper I'd be in and out in under 10 minutes...but good grief! I am almost always having to wait for somebody or something. Don't you ever have to deal with that?
Don't you ever have to deal with that?
Nope. If the reception is scheduled to start at 7:00, then I tell them I will deliver at 6:00. I always deliver approx 1 hr prior to reception starting time.
Any venue should have the room set up at approx an hour prior to guest arrival time. If they don't, they are pretty unorganized. If I've never been there before, I call to introduce myself and confirm arrival time. I always ask bride to relay my delivery time, also.
If, for some reason, I had to deliver REALLY early, I'd be sure to make contact ahead of time and arrange that.
OP is very talented....but if i remember right....she's only been doing this under a year....she will be amazed at the speed she build up to in the coming years.
i've been at this 10 years now, it's just been the last few years i've built up speed.....i got to hear how slow i was the first couple years too(it sucked out loud)..... but i see why now that i've got my own place.
as K8 and snarky said, there are a lot of tricks and shortcuts that make a world of difference...i wish i would have learned about molds and stencils sooner.
but in her defense i worked at a place once where they took orders for literally anything, and we had to crank em out...even if we didn't know how, we had to figure it out....it was like a nightmare looking thru those orders and seeing what they took an order for now.....of course we had multiple cakes we had to do in a 8 hour shift.
14 hours is a very long time to do any cake.....duff's peeps take that long, but they start at 1000.00.
she is very talented, but i couldn't afford to keep her at that price, i think the owner needs to be smart enough to know some cakes are just not worth making....i couldn't make that cake at my shop and come out ahead.....even if it only took 3 hours, i'd have to charge over 600.00 for it, and i just couldn't get that much here.
home decorating and doing it from a shop are 2 different worlds....i refer cakes like this to a home decorator in my area, i just can't devote the time.
the cakes op makes couldn't be cuter....she should prolly venture out on her own, she'd do great.
it's a real balancing act when you are running a biz.
Don't you ever have to deal with that?
Nope. If the reception is scheduled to start at 7:00, then I tell them I will deliver at 6:00. I always deliver approx 1 hr prior to reception starting time.
Any venue should have the room set up at approx an hour prior to guest arrival time. If they don't, they are pretty unorganized. If I've never been there before, I call to introduce myself and confirm arrival time. I always ask bride to relay my delivery time, also.
If, for some reason, I had to deliver REALLY early, I'd be sure to make contact ahead of time and arrange that.
I guess I'm just lucky then. haha.
I agree, great discussion. It's difficult. As much as one may want to know how well they are doing...the questions always seems to be....do they really want to know?...The Good, The Bad and The Ugly?? ( Loved the movie). The truth can be a big pill to swallow.
So many great points have been made. Some may have seeemed harsh at first, but I truely believe it came from the heart. In the end, sugar coating doesn't help anyone. It's always easier to get somewhere once you know where you are starting from and where you are headed. I believe her best is yet to come!
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