There is a huge indoor playcentre here opening in 2 weeks..State of the Art,Birthday rooms,Cupcake bar,Balloon services,Offer a slab cake with EI on it with every birthday package that is purchased ...You name it they have it and they are renting over 500 cakepans..Character and such...so Mom's can bake the cake to bring to the party..(If they rent a party package from them or bake at home..)I'm sure they have already looked into the copyright thing with the rentals as they are huge and I know the woman and her husband who are opening it..she is very thorough.I actually got her into being a consultant for the party supply company I am part of..and she frequently emailed me about cakes as before this venture..she offered a character cake with every face painting party she booked(She had a small home based face painting company and offered cakes with her packages..She did them herself but only character cakes..She sent a few customer to me who wanted more elaborate designs...

I kinda feel like they are taking some customers away from the home decorater now as everyone is going to flock to this playcentre to book their parties and since they offer a cake as part of the package and obviously won't allow outside cakes in...Part of me is happy for her I mean "Good for you" and the other part is green with envy as I would love to be able to have the money to do such a venture or open my own cake/cupcake shop..Just don't have the capital it takes to do anything other than home business.

Your thoughts on how would you feel??



Laurel

Wow, others can bring in a cake? Where I live you can't bring in an outside cake to any places that does the cooking, it is a violation of the health code laws.

But - it may not take any business away. The mother's could rent the pans and have you make the cake. My guess is if you have people coming to you to make the cakes, then they aren't going to start just because they can get the pan from them. I would advertise that you will bake the cake for them in the rented pan. It may drum up business from you.

In full disclosure I am not in business.

Linda...I don't think you can there either (Bring in outside food as it also is a health issue but they are allowing the rented pan/baked cakes ..I don't know..kinda vague) She did say there may be some exceptions like Specialty cakes for Nuts,Gluten and Dairy Allergies but not for a while...They aren't cooking persue...Just baking.They have a state of the Art bakery built on site as well to bake the cakes for the party packages but as far a I know it won't be anything more than slab cakes with licensed Edible images on them.No custom work!!Which begs the question..Why spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on a bakery to bake slab cakes...anyway..They will offer food like cheese trays/fruit,veggie trays etc..no actually cooked food.They are doing so much marketing and radio spots,print ads etc that I'm sure the grand opening will be huge as this city is lacking this type of facility.I guess I feel like most of the business will end up going over there and I will slow right down...

I was checking out their website the other day because they were advertising that they were hiring bakers. I understood that the cakes they will make there will be the edible image ones only, not the character pan ones but that they do rent those ones out. There are a lot of places that allow the cake to be brought in for the party. The play center out here in Okotoks does, but no other food.

I don't really see how this will take any business away from you. If the customer truly wants a character cake they were already going to be at the grocery store buying one since you can't make that for them anyway. If people want something different and cool then they look for someone else. And there are a few places around here that already rent out pans, so if they want to do that they could anyway.

I am only a hobby baker but would love to be able to be licenced and in business. Can you tell me how difficult it was to get licensed in Calgary? I see all kinds of people advertising on Kijiji for the Calgary area but honestly it doesn't look to me that they are licensed.

if you can't beat them, join them.

so, if business picks up, will they REALLY have the time to even bake the cakes.

Offer to have her hire you to be the official cake decorator.

Then she has a NEW service to upsell.

can get the "basic" slab & image cake or can get a custom cake by you.

You get state of the art kitchen with them paying for the overhead.

You get the opportunity to still create custom cakes

You will have to sacrifice some artistic expression doing the slab cakes.

Hvanaalst....I'm not sure about now but when I did it several years ago one had to have a seperate kitchen other than the one used everyday for home use.It may have changed since then.You may want to get in touch with Tubb here on CC as she is also located in Calgary and recently opened a licensed home business.She wil be able to help out with the current regulations required by the Health Dept etc...

Yes..I am suspecting that those who advertise on Kijiji are not licensed either.

P.S.I am not knocking the Playcentre just wondering how it may affect us local home businesses..Maybe not at all..I am glad to see something like that opening!


Laurel

Doug..I have already looked into that and she I don't think she is crazy about the idea or wanting to go in that direction yet..Plus..I don't want to work for anyone and have to leave my house and drive across the city everyday or even 2-3 days a week for her to maybe pay me $13.00-$15.00 and hour...just an estimate..But No Thanks!!

I'll stay home and be available for my kids and NOT have to pay Day home fees etc...

Just wanted to get everyone's take on it!! Great concept though....

Yeah..I may look into after a few months and see how things go....It may be a good opportunity for a great relationship....

It sounds like a great idea, and I don't think it make too much of a difference with you. Especially since they don't do custom cakes...
Where is located in Calgary?(i'm asking because I used to live there, SW off of 17th Ave. Loved it!)
Totally off topic... How was Stampede this year??
Jodi

I live in the north end of town..Stampede is good but the weather has hindered quite a bit and the fact the animals rights groups are really hasseling them about the treatment of animals but other than that..same as usual!

A separate kitchen is still required. i don't live in a place I can do that now, but hopefully in a couple years. I am thinking of renting kitchen space but not quite ready. My oldest starts kindergarten in september so will have a little more time then. I would love to open a cupcake shop here in okotoks but that is definitely not something i could do in the near future.

I try to avoid stampede if I can. Too many crazy people and way too expensive. I took the kids to Callaway instead last week.

Yup..I agree..Being a native Calgarian,the Stampede isn't a place where I want to spend my hard earned dollars...My BIL and SIL tooks my kids and their own last Sunday..They were there all day and probably spent about $400.00 with all the junk they came home with but at least they got to see it and I didn't have to go down there and take them myself.....HA!HA!

Just this past year my youngest started grade 1 so I now have my days back with no interuption..You will soon too..Look into churches etc to rent their kitchens...I know the Anglican church over here rents their kitchen out to a small home based company who makes and supplies hot lunches for the schools.

Hey...what about starting up a New Tea Room like the Ginger Tea once was..That was hugley popular and I know it would do well...

Someone just opened a coffee shop out hear that also sells baked goods, cupcakes and do custome cakes. I was disappointed to see one but what can you do. I think Okotoks would go crazy for a tea place too. My youngest will go to school next year so then I will get much more serious about this.

I think Okotoks would love to have something like that.
I haven't been there is a couple of years, but it was a nice place.
I hope everything works out for you too.
I have a almost 2year old little boy and the cakes are getting harder to do.
He doesn't want to be in the house at all, and who can blame him?
Especially when its 36C + outdoors... the last thing I want to do is have the oven going and a kitchen to clean up! lol
BUT, I love it!
Jodi

What's the difference between making money off a copyrighted pan by renting it out 100 times x $10 each = $1000

Or making cakes and selling them 25 times x $40 each = $1000 (less cost of supplies)????

Just curious.

That is a good point. I wonder if it is really legal to rent them out. I hadn't really thought of it before, but there are lots of places that do it.

Vkandis I mean legally...its illegal to sell the cakes made from copyrighted pans so I don't know why it would be legal to continually make a profit by renting them out....?

This post was wrong based on looking at wrong copyright law.

Ahh apologies I thought you were just looking at it from a monetary point of view.

Argh edit based on new info.

Well I may have the answer. I thought about other rental services such as movies so was checking into opening a video rental store and found that you only need to acquire a movie rental liscence. You then have to acquire the movies from a wholesale distributor no going down to WalMart and buying movies.

If they are doing it legally there may be a similar liscence for renting products based on copyrighted images. Could not find this because I did could not figure out the right search terms. But if such a lisence exists it would explain why they would be able to rent the pans.

Hi kiddiekakes
What is your party supply company?