AI made a cake for a friend'a daughter's birthday. Two tiers, 2 10inch and the top was 2 6 inch cakes. She paid for the ingredients so instead of doing it per serving I just do it for the time I spent on it correct?
How do I calculate that? I'm not a professional at all so do I charge myself minimum wage ?
A
Original message sent by gcgb53191
I made a cake for a friend'a daughter's birthday. Two tiers, 2 10inch and the top was 2 6 inch cakes. She paid for the ingredients so instead of doing it per serving I just do it for the time I spent on it correct?
How do I calculate that?[B] I'm not a professional at all so do I charge myself minimum wage[/B] ?
If it was up to me, I'd charge $0. It's either you're a business or you're not.
No matter what you "charge", it will be too much. That agreement should have been made BEFORE the cake was made.
Most people have no idea how long it takes. They "see" walmart decorators ice a cake in 5 minutes in the window. It WILL cause problems between you and the friend.
You will find out real quick how this can cause trouble with a friend. You will come up with a "price" and either she thinks its too much or isn't happy with the cake or you realize how much time you spent on this cake and didn't get paid nearly enough. Or she just won't pay you anything. I don't like doing cakes for friends at all or family for that matter which is even worse. I am in business and treat it as such so don't give discounts to friends or family and if they don't want to pay my price so be it, I'm not upset about it. I do however make free cakes for my immediate family which I am fine with since I get to do whatever I want on those cakes so I get to experiment with new techniques. I have to agree with not taking any money on this cake. You are not a business and she has paid for the ingredients which should be sufficient since you aren't a business and unless you are in a state with a cottage food law you will be illegally doing this cake.
If the friend thinks a cake takes 15 minutes to bake and 15 minutes to ice, she "owes" you for 1/2 hour... at $10/hr... that's $5.
If you took 8 hours, and feel you "earned" $80, and the friend knows it takes time, but just thinks you are slow.. why should she pay you $80, when she thinks it should be $60. (I am slow myself, so I understand my "output" make be much slower that some younger, more experienced pros).
You never agreed on a price/payment in advance. That is a recipe for disaster. Your friend will feel "ripped off" and you will feel "used" or "unappreciated".
If she is a great friend, then it is free/ a gift. If she is not a great friend, then the expectation of a "fair" payment, negotiated AFTER the cake is eaten, always causes problems.
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Not sure why this is something that would cause problems between two friends lol. But alright I'll just figure something out.
If you'd taken the time to use the search function and look up pricing you wouldn't be so disrespectfully laughing at others responses to your question. Anyone who takes their cake making seriously (which obviously you don't) has run into problems with family and friends. So, go ahead, laugh it off and keep making cakes for free.
I'm flat out amazed at some of the stories I read sometimes. I don't know when the definition of friend changed, but to me a friend is someone who is respectful, courteous, supports your business ventures by either purchasing from you at full price, or at a discount ONLY IF the decorator offers, not because you whined and cried about it, or politely declines and instead gets a cake from the grocery store, NOT betty sue cheapskate down the street. 
A
Original message sent by AZCouture
I'm flat out amazed at some of the stories I read sometimes. I don't know when the definition of friend changed, but to me a friend is someone who is respectful, courteous, supports your business ventures by either purchasing from you at full price, or at a discount ONLY IF the decorator offers, not because you whined and cried about it, or politely declines and instead gets a cake from the grocery store, NOT betty sue cheapskate down the street. :lol:
What is more amazing are people who doesn't respect themselves or their business and let their friends/family treat them like dirt! And then whine and rant to strangers on a forum.
Oh I forgot LOL:D
No you're right, that's more amazing, because it's their own fault. You're only treated the way you allow yourself to be treated. Which makes me wonder, and in fact I just said this to some other friends in a group of ours on Facebook.....how do decorators that are super cheap and always seem to be complaining about their customers ever enjoy their work? When the majority of their customers are cheap, demanding, and always trying to get something for nothing. Who honestly enjoys that work? Where is the joy? :(
And just like the friends situation, it's completely their fault, they invite it by being cheap and marketing to cheap ungrateful people. Still....where is the joy? It's not a law that work has to be fun, but I enjoy my work, and I pick who I work for. I don't work for jerks.
AThe joy comes from the FB likes, probably.
The reason I quit my job: I don't want to work for jerks. And stupid people who doesn't want to pay you enough but drives a red sports car!:-D
Oh no kidding. It's amusing to see people get all worked up over likes. I get at least 4 messages a day asking me to share their page on mine, or begging to know my secrets to getting more likes, or straight up dropping their links on my wall like they were invited. UGH! Who cares about likes unless they're people that are going to buy your cake? Im not talking about people truly looking to network and make contacts for future referrals or making friends, I fully support that, I mean the people who honestly think there's some sort of race to get as many likes as possible. Shoot, I have almost 300,000 likes, and if I could give them all away I would. It's a pain in the butt policing my page to make sure it's not full of spam or offensive language. And the cake requests from other countries, that gets obnoxious. And the messages in foreign languages....really annoying.
AMost of my likers are family so i don't bother doing promos like some other pages. My family and friends don't buy cake from me. If I like them they might get a free cake on their kid's birthday or they can go someplace else. Clients I meet through referrals or wedding fairs go straight to my website. I don't even post my fbpage to 'like me, i'll like you cake groups' because I won't get business from it.
Who cares about likes unless they're people that are going to buy your cake?
AZ I completely agree, I don't have many likers and it doesn't really bother me bc I know the ones I have are clients or friends of clients (i.e. future clients). I recently had an offer from a dealer I buy from and have gotten close to to put a link up on his page but I turned it down bc we are not even on the same continent and it doesn't interest me to have hundreds more likers from the other side of the Atlantic. I don't ship.
(Although AZ, I liked your page a while ago bc your cakes are so beautiful, so now you (sort of) know another person on your Likes list
)
ALike I told the other pricing issue this is what I know. Calculate all costs in baking this cake, ( keep receipts) triple it to cover your time and overhead costs ( electricity from using oven, water to wash dishes you used, etc.) I think that would be more than fair. Good luck:-)
ANo, my basis for this calculation is serving size, since a cupcake is a serving size then if out of $8.00 you baked a dozen cupcakes then multiply by 3 then divide by 12. That will give you a price of $2/ cupcake. Other decorations depending on how intricate, size other embellishment s, kind of fillings etc. should be added separately to your cost. As you can see all of these adds up. Now figure out how much to charge for a cake with this formula. Good luck.
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No, my basis for this calculation is serving size, since a cupcake is a serving size then if out of $8.00 you baked a dozen cupcakes then multiply by 3 then divide by 12. That will give you a price of $2/ cupcake. Other decorations depending on how intricate, size other embellishment s, kind of fillings etc. should be added separately to your cost. As you can see all of these adds up. Now figure out how much to charge for a cake with this formula. Good luck.
By you saying you add for embellishments means your pricing formula does not work. I must ask, do you have a business? Have you sat down with all of your costs, paper towels, water, gas, dishwashing soap and calculated that you are making a sustainable profit? If not, I would be careful before giving advice to the newbies here as they are impressionable and I realized very quickly after doing cakes that these simple multiply by three does not work for customizable cakes. Making a chocolate figurine costs me $3....you bet I am charging more than $9 for that thing! Takes me about 2 hours to make! Just some things to think about for yourself...you may be underselling yourself. Now, if you are saying you would charge more for the figurine, that means your formula does not work, and you are confusing people on here. Maybe you didn't think about it in this manner, but really, you are probably under pricing yourself.
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