First, allow me to say what a great place this is.
The knowledge of the membership here is awesome.
That being said, I want to share with you our journey into the cake decorating business.
We started back in the eighties by doing church craft fairs.
We would set up a table with a nicely decorated cake and a sheet cake for tasting. We had a sign clearly stating free samples, and had precut pieces on small paper plates. We also had business cards strewn about the table.
We had accrued quite a following for our cakes, which is a little funny in retrospect. You see, we used mixes that were sold in the generic section of the store. (remember those green stripes that denoted "generic")?
Anyway, it turned out that these tasted better than the name brands. We also used good quality fillings and apricot glaze to help against crumbs.
Our cakes were topped with good buttercream for the most part.
It got to the point where even the church was ordering cakes and petit fors from us. We move to Michigan in 1993 and never re-established our business.
I will be doing that very soon.
We also found that we could order plain unfrosted cakes from our local superstore when we were in a pinch for time. This way all we had to worry about is the decorating. This may be a viable option for those of you who feel uncomfortable with the baking aspects or like us, pressed for time.
It then becomes someone else's problem to acheive good quality cake.
Then all you have to do is fill, frost and fly.
We did several wedding cakes this way, and do to the quality of our other ingredients, the cakes still bore "our signature flavor".
I hope to have a few images to post when I get some cakes made up.
Well enough of my longwinded blabbering, I'm off to find a craft show.
Hello and welcome to a fellow Michigander! This site is wonderful, you will find it to be a great resource!
Welcome to Cake Central!!
Warning: You WILL be addicted to this website!
Thanks for the warm welcome.
I kinda feel like I'm home already.
I just remembered another little marketing gimmick we used at the church shows.
The night before the show I would bake a chocolate and a yellow cake.
I would then pinch little pieces and roll them into a small cone to use as rose bases, usually ending up with a few hundred all together.
I kept these in a cooler at the show. Throughout the day, I would pipe little roses out of buttercream and place them on a tray for free tasting. People were amazed at how someone could actually make something that looked like a rose out of icing and many stood for minutes watching my impromtu demonstrations.
Give it a try.
Welcome and thank you for your "tricks of the trade".
You are obviously an already accomplished decorator and I look forward to seeing some of your masterpieces.
I really like your idea of the rose bases. I know generally if the kids in my neighborhood know when I am decorating a cake, they love to come and watch.
Again, welcome to this truly wonderful site! 
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