I know the forum is over-run with pricing questions at the moment, and I promised myself I would not add to it by posting myself. But I do need help, I really do.

I normally do not charge for my cakes, I have been doing them either as gifts for friends and family, or for cost for other people I know. I am about to go legal so will have to start charging soon. I made this cake below this weekend, and I have already had a request for another cake like it. The lady who enquired about the jungle cake wants to know the price by tomorrow and I am really unsure about how much to charge.

The cake below cost me $42.50 to make, excluding supplies like the food coloring and baking powder, ai. stuff that is difficult to calculate. The cost does not allow for electricity either. It took probably about 12 hours to make all together. It is buttercream with fondant/gumpaste animals.

With regards to what other people charge around here, the field is quite wide. There are not many individuals making cakes here, but typically a 1/4 sheet cake with a star tip decorated top, like Dora or Nemo, will be around $40. A supermarket 1/4 sheet cake is around $13.

A party I went to recently had a 2 tier castle cake, all buttercream and simple decorations, probably 50-60 servings. That had cost $150 from a bakery.

So what do you think, what should I charge for this cake?

I would safely say $75, but I am not that good at pricing, so here's ya a bump!

I wouldn't charge less than $175. You need to make some money for your time. If people want your cake bad enough, they will pay for it. If not, then at least you won't feel like you put in a lot of work and didn't get paid for it.

BTW, your cake is absolutely beautiful.

Yvette

A very smart person told me one time that a good way to price is to take your cost and multiply by 3. If you would like to get paid more for your time then x4. Hope this helps.

How many does that cake serve?

I would say at least $150. How many people would this serve?

Thanks for your replies so far, it is very helpful! Sorry, forgot to include the sizes of the cakes. It is a 6" round on top of a 9" square, both two layers. It was meant to serve 40.

I would say it was worth around $3 a serving so $120.

I also go with multiplying the total cost by 3 plus a little extra if there are molded figures (cause those are time consuming.

I see 7 fondant animals, they add to the price between $3 - $5 each because of the time and "fiddliness"...
$42.50 plus $21 - $35...
$63 -$77, plus $30 - $40 for your 'cake' time..
$93 - $117 .

Minimum.

in my bakery merchandising class they say take supplies and multiply by 5. great cake

Okay, now I gotta know, how much approximately did it take you to make the cake with extra supplies like the boards, etc?

Sarah

Thank you all for your replies. It was very helpful to me. In the end we settled on $150 for the cake, which she would be happy to pay and I would be happy to receive.

Good Job! I'm late with this but I probably would of charged $90-100 myself