Hey there!
I am marketing myself as a "Custom Cake Artist" to an upscale customer base. I am o.k. with pricing tiered cakes but lost when pricing the 3D's. First it's harder to determine an exact serving size and there is a lot of work. And they are always different!
How do you determine the price of your 3D cakes?
So far mine have all been given as gifts & I have no idea what I would have charged for any of them!...HELP!!!
What would be a good price for these?
.......sorry pics to big to load & I don't know how to fix......
You can see them in my album or http://edibleillusions.googlepages.com
Monkey is about 14" high with a round cake on bottom, then doll pan, sm round & ball pan head + odd bits & pcs to build it up.
Elmo is more or less the same but a lot more involved (the fur!!)
He is sitting on a 12" Krispie Treat.
Actually that leads to another question...How to price that. Would you charge the same as for a 12" cake?
Thanks so much!!!! You all know how hard the pricing can be!!
This is what I charge for sculpted cakes. $3.50 w/o fondant, $4.50 with fondant. Hope that helps....
Also, be careful, Elmo is a copyright character. That means it is illegal to sell a sculpted cake of him without paying loyalties to his maker. I wasn't sure if you were aware of this or not. Just wanted to give you a warning if you weren't.
Wow, your cakes are great. If I were you I would do a search on "3D cakes" on google and see what others are charging or their phylosophy about it.
The way I see it, you charge for the ingredients and then for your time and you should not be making $5/hr 3D is an art and should be paid as such.
I am including a few links I have saved overtime.
I have seen a few bakeries that will say how much a 3D cake serves approx and then they have the price.
For example:
https://secure.kowalskis.com/CakeDetails.cfm?ID=88
http://www.aboutthecake.com/3dsculptedcakes.htm
I really like this site for all the stuff she does:
http://www.3dcakes.co.uk/
I really like this person's philosophy about 3D cakes and the reason for pricing.
http://www.cakes.co.nz/pricing.html
Good Luck.
I agree... You want to make sure you are making money, not losing it. I guess I should have been more clear, thank you gateaux. My base starts at $3.50/serving w/o fondant, $4.50 with fondant. Depending on the detail work and such, my price will go up from there. I was just giving a starting point. All little detail work, figurines, ect. cost extra.
I agree with TPDC,
I also think that if you are going to make figures, I have seen a few post on this and people asking how much should they charge for Fondant Figures. I think again depending on size and amount of work you should charge accordingly by the figure. The more the figures in a design the higher the cost.
Good Luck.
Thanks for asking this question! And thanks for all of the links, gateaux!
One place near me has this on their website about pricing sculpted cakes:
Custom Sculpural Work
2-D Cakes $80.00 minimum, $2.50 per slice plus labor/sculpture time*
(Add $.50 for rolled fondont)
3-D Cakes $100.00 minimum, $3.50 per slice plus labor/sculpture time*
* Labor/Sculpture time billed at $50.00 per hour
I would love to see how they do a quote for a customer. Since each cake is so unique, it's so hard for me to guess how long it would take, but if I had the guts to charge $50/hour, I wouldn't feel so bad if I was short a few hours. 
Thanks!!
Gateaux..I checked those sites..Thanks! The last one (3Dcakes) Chocolate Earth, their cakes are FAB_U_LOUS!! I would love to get their prices. More than anything I need guts. I tell myself "people pay $$ for a krispie treat some one dips in chocolate..why no my cakes" but it's hard (I know I can't afford one of my cakes!) but they are still worth it.
I also know of a bakery that charges $50 an hour for extra work. I was wondering how too. And they don't do 3D or anything too fancy.
HAH!! Some of my cakes take all night, I'd love to bill that by the hour!!
I do plan on putting a $ min of at least $100. You should all check out the site Gateaux sent... the last one..3Dcakes (??) she is right that site makes a great point on pricing.
OOPS!!!
This is the site with the great pricing philosophy (Thanks Gateaux!)
http://www.cakes.co.nz/pricing.html
If there are any more replies I won't be back to check them until tonight.
I am watching my grand-daughters (1)
Wow, chocolate earth's cakes are AMAZING!! I love their pricing guidelines too, just wish I could actually charge what they do for 3D cakes! That's a New Zealand site, right?...so basically in American dollars that would mean their base price is about $650? Maybe someday I could charge that, but not yet.
At the moment I charge a minimum of $80 for 2D and $100 for 3D cakes. When it's a larger cake, then I'll charge at least $3 per serving. The ones that I can tell will be extra time consuming I've been starting off at $150. I'm still not averaging very much per hour though, easily spending 10-20 hours on 3D cakes! Still, It's hard to imagine charging like $500 for a kid's birthday cake! 
Courtney
You might want to visit this post to get some ideas about pricing. I could not find it until I read it again in another post a few minutes ago.
http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-148801-matrix.html
Alicegop created this price matrix. It's really cool.
Good Luck.
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