Kinda long, Sorry
Ok, I teach cake decorating at a local store, and normaly i just teach adults, but about a month ago i got a call from a lady that asked about teaching a group of girl scouts. after talking it over with co- workers i decided that i would do it. I had decided after talking to the lady that my fee would be $20 each girl. That was for Cakes for each girl, All the icing to frost and decorate (and probably left overs to take with them), their tips bags and couplers ( that they would KEEP), and a badge. All this and I would teach them for 3hrs. The lady said she would talk it over with the others and let me know. Today one of the leaders from this group called and and i explained everything to her again, and she seemed angry. She said that $5 per child was what they were willing to pay. i explained the cost to her again she she still seemed angry. She said she would call back ( I will be shocked if she does). Was i wrong for asking $20?
Yes and no. $20 is a pretty reasonable price for all that they are getting ( a cake, icing, tips, bags and couplers). However, we're talking a rather low-budget group. Those girls have to raise all the money for their activities for the whole year by selling cookies once a year. If you are talking 10 girls that is a hefty chunk of their money. Also, I don't know what level girls you were going to teach, but the lower the level the less they actually have to learn in order to get the badge. I taught a group of Brownies recently. I brought in MY tips, bags, etc and let them use those. We made one cake during the class, which the leader brought in the ingredients for and got to take home. (they just had to participate in making a cake). I made a double batch of buttercream and the leader brought in some cupcakes. We had the girls practice on paper plates and then they got to decorate 3 cupcakes however they wanted to take home. The whole thing took an hour. Since my daughter is in the troop I just charged for the icing. Anyway, if the leader in the second phone call was already angry when she called there probably wouldn't have been any negotiation possible, but you might have been able to come up with a way to satisfy their requirements cheaper. Perhaps each girl could have brought in her own cake and been given the option of borrowing your tools or purchasing the decorating tools herself ahead of time.
Sorry for such a long reply. In the end, Yes I think it was a reasonable price for what they were getting, but there probably could have been a way to cut the cost.
I don't think you are wrong. That is alot of work on your part the baking, making icing and gathering all the things together. I probably would have thought to ask more than you.
If they are only willing to pay $5 a girl maybe you can give them a list of items they will need to buy and bring for you to teach them???
Sorry, but I do think that $20 per child is a lot for a single class, even with supplies provided. Wilton has a program that looks pretty reasonable. Here's a link to the info:
http://www.wilton.com/recipes/icingfunkidsproject/
It would run $3.99-$4.99 per child for the kit (before a tax exempt discount of 25% if the scout troop ordered them).
I would think that most families could provide a child with a small cake or cupcakes and a can of icing to decorate. That would leave only your fee to worry about, and that would be up to you.
I came back to edit this because the more I thought about it, if you're a WMI, the scout people may be aware of the program I mentioned (either from the Wilton website or from a call to Wilton) and perhaps the anger stems from the idea that you're "upcharging" by $15-$16/child. The anger may be misplaced, but it sounds like some assumptions or misinformation may have preceded their call to you--unfortunate, but perhaps understandable. Maybe another phone call would make everyone comfortable with the resolution.
JMHO
Rae
You are an instructor because you like/love decorating and you're trying to make a living.
The Girl Scouts are a fine group of kids, but for their needs (to get a badge) it's unreasonable of them to basically ask you to donate your time and most of the equipment needed for their project.
It was also unreasonable for the leader be angry with you. They asked, you answered, their choice on how to proceed.
HTH
Considering everything you would have included, $20 seems very reasonable. But like others have mentioned on here, perhaps $20 is a little steep for the little girls, especially since I'm assuming most of them wouldn't have much of an attention span to stay patient and calm and doubtful that they can do a whole lot of special techniques.
Did the girl scout leader say anything about paying you to teach the girls or did the leader insinuate that perhaps you would donate your time to teach them? Maybe they thought you would donate your time instead of them paying. I think if you wanted to donate your time to teach them (or even charge them a lower price), here are a few options you could do:
*have the girls bring in their own personal sized cake or cupcake (maybe the leader could just bake a batch of cupcakes to bring in).
*have the girls bring in canned frosting to use.
*instead of teaching the girls about using different tips and such, maybe do a demonstration with a cake and show the girls how you frost the cake, pipe boarders, do writing, etc.
*after that, the girls can frost their cupcakes and maybe top them with sprinkles or colored sugar. You could even put colored frosting into sandwich bags, snip off the corners, and let them make zig zags and such.
*instead of doing 3 hours (which seems like an awful long time to try to teach little girls hopped up on sugar), perhaps only do 30-60 minutes.
Thank for everyones help.
In the beginning i did suggest that they get thier own supplys, but the first lady wanted packages put to gether so all parents had to do was bring girls in. Thats why i went with that approach. I think that IF she calls back i will tell her that $5 is fine but they will need their own supplys, and go from there.
Thanks Again
Sounds like you were perfectly appropriate. There's no need to get huffy with you - if they thought that was too much, then the appropriate response from their end is "what can we do to get the cost down? That's a lot to ask the girls to pay," to which I'm sure you'd have responded with some of the suggestions in the previous posts.
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