i am just waiting for my cake to cook... i dont have any cake orders this week and am bored, so i thought i would make a few small round cakes and decorate them kinda basic with roses and give them to my neighbors just to let them know i "do" cakes. although i do not have a liscense at this moment....i will have to have a meeting down the road with them all for a special zone permit so i can get my liscense. anyway, i was wondering if you guys ever did this?
i thought i would just give them the cake and let them know i do cakes so they should call me for their special events. any thoughts?
you guys should do the same.....your not really advertising, your giving your neighbors a gift. also i have a couple of neighbors that just moved in and i havent met them yet.
i'll let you know how many orders i get, hahaha
melody

my husband keeps telling me to do the same thing. he want me to rent a booth at our base exchange and give free samples and also show pictures of my work. i'm not sure if i can, but giving them to neighbors sounds like great adverstisement to me!!

last year i did a local craft show. i made decorated cookies and sold them and i also sold cute cupcakes and then i made a couple of cakes and decorated them. i passed out business cards to everyone that passed by (although after being on this and the wilton site have learned that your not supposed to pass out cards if your not liscensed...so i'll have to think of something else..............ohhhhhh what an idea.....i can make giant cakes shaped like in numbers that are my phone number, hahahha then i am not passing out cards. ) here you have a grey area to work in...with out a liscense you can sell your pies, cakes, cookies at craft shows
okay, you need to make small cakes to take to your neighbors....if they do not know what you do, they cant order from you.
melody

okay, i made little 6 inch cakes, three cakes out of one mix and used my left over icing from my class. i took them to three niegbors and introduced myself and told them i make cakes and thought i would make one for them. (i also put my phone number on the cake, haha) they love it....and i got an order for a baby shower cake for next month!!!!!
i am doing a local craft fair next weekend, i think i am going to make my little 6" cakes and have them boxed up and see if people will buy mothers day cakes the day before mothers day. i think i'll only do 5-6 because it is a small craft fair. so, what would you charge for a small decorated 6" round with roses for mothers day? thanks for help!



get to baking for your neigbhors!!!
melody

Those are all cute ideas... I have one more... Take them to church! I started volunteering to makes for baby showers and wedding showers. Once everyone saw my cakes and liked them, the word was out and I do a couple cakes a week now.

heres another idea.........i did this for valentines day and will probably do it for mothers day tooo....

I call my regular customers and tell thell that Im picking up orders for mothers day and if they would like for me to reserve one for them.......

most people love to buy cakes for special occassions and put them to decorate their tables ...but i find that they usually just drop in the store and grab one this way they know that they dont have to worry about it .....

thanks for ideas!!!!!
melody

they say word of mouth is the best.. IM sure if you give a few away and show pictures.. you'd get some orders... iI did that with my shop. Not cakes though.. I gave Party Trays and Big dinner platters away to local businesses. Now i have at least 15 trays a week that people are ordering.. i think its worth it! At least it was for me! Good Luck!

I've been giving my practice cakes away to the neighbors, but not so much as an advertisement....more to ensure that I do't eat the cake <grin>

But you guys just gave me a great idea.....we have our community garage sale on June 4th....a HUGE event and with more than 150 homes participating, we get quite a bit of traffic. Since I already plan on participating, maybe I will bake some demo cakes and lots of fun cupcakes. I can display the cakes with my new business cards (more on that to follow) and sell the cupcakes to the kids (gotta come up with some cute ideas!)

I did the same for my practice cakes, gave them away. I am truely amazed at how my neighbors love FREE cake!! I told them I do cakes..
Then when I did this new creation of my mom's day cake, I gave a couple of them to my neighbors and ended up with my phone ringing for 5 more cakes.
They asked me for business cards and since I don't have that, I just printed something small with my name and phone number and email address and gave that with the cake and box.
Can you all imagine if we ate all those practice cakes we make!!! Hmmm...
the world would be filled with so much of us sweetnees'es.......hehe......
Have a great day.......

thats funny.. i am not a big sweets person.. like i can eat maybe a handful of chocolate chips a year..and im happy.. but my sister.. she can put away some icing lol.. I have an amazing Pumpkin Roll recipe and it has the Cream Cheese Filling... People rave over it lol.. And its good other times not just turkey dya lol..anyways..and every time i make those.. i have to make an extra batch of icing so my elder sister can eat it... lol..

Sorry just trying to figure this out.

Lisa