Yard Sale Pricing Of Cupcake Bouquet - And Sizes? Other?
Decorating By berryblondeboys Updated 16 May 2007 , 2:09pm by rittenhouse
Hi, I'm president of a local Moms Club and a couple months a husband of one of our stay at home moms had a brain hemorrhage and died quite suddenly leaving behind two children - ages 7 and 5 and the older has pretty severe autism. Our club has been making meals, shopping for her, helping with cleaning and now we are having a yard sale as part of a community yard sale. All proceeds will go to the Mom in need.
We were having a hard time getting enough 'other' donation, so we decided to add a bake sale to the efforts. A bunch of moms are baking cookies,bars, and normal bake sale fare. I thought it might be a good seller to make a few cupcake bouquets. Gives me a chance to try this out and it's a pretty cool "gift" for someone to buy...
but... what sizes should I make? and what prices? Should I do mini cupcakes? regular? or both? I want it to raise money, so I don't want to underprice, but I don't want them just sitting there unsold either!
Suggestions? Other things you can think I could make that would be a good seller?
Melissa
IMHO, Yard salers (me being a Huge one!) tend to go yard saleing with the mindset of not spending much money and trying to get the best bargain. Usually for a yard sale with a good cause, you don't barter as much (if at all). However, for what a cupcake bouquet is worth, I would be surprised if you would sell many of them. You may be better off only having one or two, then selling individual cupcakes for $1 or 2 or selling mini cupcakes by the half dozen. In my experience, we buy the baked goods to snack on during our yard saleing, and a cupcake bouquet almost seems too fancey. Again, Just my opinion.
You might make some small sized ones... easier to cary away. I don't know how close to end of school you guys are but these would make great teacher gifts. That might be a good marketing ploy for an early Friday morning yard sale. Teacher gift ready to go and all. Minis in a small pot sound soooo cute to me. Don't know about pricing. Maybe a dollar a cupcake, or a $1.50? Would that cover your expense of a container too? Never made one but am becoming more inspired over the last few days. I have seen lots of pic recently...all are tooo cute!!!
HTH.
BTW...blessings to the mom and to all of you guys for standing tall beside her she is going to need you guys for a long time!!
Mel,
unfortunately, I think Iheartcake might be right. Garage salers not planning on buying something like that probably won't on a whim, and if it's warm out, they might not do so well in a warm car while they continue their yard-sale shopping.
I wonder if you had a few display cupcake boquets out, and could try to take orders for pickup or delivery later, with the proceeds still going to your cause. And you could sell individual cupcakes with the flower decorations on top to raise money on the spot.
And maybe each sample cupcake you sell could have a certificate for people to bring back to you with their orders later, and the certificate lets you know that the order will go towards the family?
I did a garage sale with all money going towards breast cancer last year, and the surprising thing to me was that people donated money for little cups of coffee. We put the coffee maker right out at the table where you paid, and you would not believe the look of pure relief to see the coffee there! You could probably charge a buck a cup (small ones) and people will generally donate more. It's cheap and easy to do. Maybe offer a few other juices too.
Another thing we tried at the bake sale was homemade doggie treats. They're easy and quick to make. Lots of people garage-sale with their dogs. Google "simple simon's dog treats". Just something different.
Just some thoughts. Good luck with the sale and let us know how it goes!
IMHO, Yard salers (me being a Huge one!) tend to go yard saleing with the mindset of not spending much money and trying to get the best bargain. Usually for a yard sale with a good cause, you don't barter as much (if at all). However, for what a cupcake bouquet is worth, I would be surprised if you would sell many of them. You may be better off only having one or two, then selling individual cupcakes for $1 or 2 or selling mini cupcakes by the half dozen. In my experience, we buy the baked goods to snack on during our yard saleing, and a cupcake bouquet almost seems too fancey. Again, Just my opinion.
yah, I was thinking of making only one or two... I might try a small cupcake one and a larger cupcake one and then a bunch of pretty individual cupcakes. I was thinking if made a larger one, $15? and a smaller one $10? Or is that too high? (and that's about a dollar a cupcake I figure).
Depending on the weather, I might make a bunch of chocolate transfer tulips to stick on top of the individual cupcakes, but if it's too warm, I'll pass on that.
Cupcakes are SOOOOO easy (far easier than a full cake) and so pretty with just a swirl on top.
You might make some small sized ones... easier to cary away. I don't know how close to end of school you guys are but these would make great teacher gifts. That might be a good marketing ploy for an early Friday morning yard sale. Teacher gift ready to go and all. Minis in a small pot sound soooo cute to me. Don't know about pricing. Maybe a dollar a cupcake, or a $1.50? Would that cover your expense of a container too? Never made one but am becoming more inspired over the last few days. I have seen lots of pic recently...all are tooo cute!!!
HTH.
BTW...blessings to the mom and to all of you guys for standing tall beside her she is going to need you guys for a long time!!
Mel,
I wish this would have been a week earlier - could have been good mother's day gifts, and teacher appreciation week was last week too! Timing for a full bouquet is a little off. I think I'll make it more just to make it and hope it sells and then do a bunch of individual ones.
unfortunately, I think Iheartcake might be right. Garage salers not planning on buying something like that probably won't on a whim, and if it's warm out, they might not do so well in a warm car while they continue their yard-sale shopping.
I wonder if you had a few display cupcake boquets out, and could try to take orders for pickup or delivery later, with the proceeds still going to your cause. And you could sell individual cupcakes with the flower decorations on top to raise money on the spot.
And maybe each sample cupcake you sell could have a certificate for people to bring back to you with their orders later, and the certificate lets you know that the order will go towards the family?
I did a garage sale with all money going towards breast cancer last year, and the surprising thing to me was that people donated money for little cups of coffee. We put the coffee maker right out at the table where you paid, and you would not believe the look of pure relief to see the coffee there! You could probably charge a buck a cup (small ones) and people will generally donate more. It's cheap and easy to do. Maybe offer a few other juices too.
Another thing we tried at the bake sale was homemade doggie treats. They're easy and quick to make. Lots of people garage-sale with their dogs. Google "simple simon's dog treats". Just something different.
Just some thoughts. Good luck with the sale and let us know how it goes!
This is a GREAT idea - well two great ideas - make a display and take orders (I can do a maximum of ten for the donation, let's say) and people can pay for it later when they order... just mention/show the certificate and they'll pay, and I'll donate to the "fund".
I also LOVE the doggie treat idea!!!! People are such suckers for their dogs and I'm SURE they'll sell... I'll be sure we keep those separately and marked well so people KNOW that it's for dogs and not humans!
Melissa
I agree that the dog treats are a terrific idea, as well as, taking orders. That was actually what I was going to suggest! I would also make sure to have ALOT of business cards on hand to pass out to people that might be interested in ordering more of your products. Another suggestion would be to have some pictures of cakes that you make or can make. Maybe just sizes and then have a raffle. You could sell the tickets for a certain price and then pick several winners for the different cake sizes, etc. So this way you don't have to actually make the cake but the winner "WINS" a 6,8, 10 inch cake and then you call them to find out what they want. I hope this doesn't sound too confusing. The point is the sell the cakes, but you don't have to make them that day and risk losing out. The winner could get the cake at a later date.
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