If the quoted price is questioned, I might say something like this:
I want to be decently paid for my work. The payment is for 3 things.
1. The cost of the product and my equipmet and energy consumption.
2. My time and labor.
3. My training, experience and skill.
Emi
Read this. Someone had it posted at another website, and it made me smile.
I had a new customer call me for a Barbie cake for this Saturday, as she had seen one on my website. Then she called me back that evening to cancell it. She was clearly ambarrassed, but i was OK with it...stuff happens. I didn't give it a thought. Next day, she calls again. She said her husband had a cow when he was told the price ($45 plus the doll, which is what they go for around here. I do the Wonder mold on top of another layer so the proportions are right, fondant dress, lots of flowers etc, and writing on the cake board.)
So HE says "How hard can it be?" HE is going to make the cake. He's taking Friday OFF to do this. Does he bake? No,
but again, how hard can it be? He's going to do a carrot cake. I recommend a pound cake instead. Than she asks me where they can buy the special pan. I send her to Michaels, and wish her good luck.
Next day she calls again. She spent the afternoon buying the pan, ingredients, etc. but insists that her husband do a trial run. He has insisted on carrot cale. He didn't prep the pan properly, and it came out in pieces. Also, it was a little undercooked in the middle. He glues it together with canned icing, shoves the doll in. The cake falls apart. At this point, he calls THE CATERER for advice. Turns out they're spending $30 a head to cater the party! NOT COUNTING THE LIQUOR!!! And my cake is too expensive??? What does the caterer say? Caterer says, and I quote - "" I never do cakes, they're too treaky. You really have to know what you're doing. Just buy the cake." Thank you MR. Caterer! So now I am doing the cake again. SWEET lesson for HIM!
when people say "I know I can get this same service for less than half of what you are asking" she says to them in the nicest way possible- "Then I really think you should try to hire them because that is a really good price" and leave it at that.
That is the perfect, most professional response!
I know it's hard to take it personally when customers don't value your product/time/talent, but in most cases it's NOT personal. Yes, some people are just irritating penny pinchers that complain about the price of anything and everything in the world and want a whole of something for nothing. BUT, in most cases it really is that the average consumer has NO CLUE all that is really involved in decorating a beautiful creation. Because you(collective you) make it look easy because your creations are so stunning, some assume that it IS easy.
YOU know that you are worth EVERY PENNY you charge!! Please don't let the uneducated consumers get you down with wanting a "bargain". Remember, "some will, some won't, some do, some don't........next please!"
(((((((HUGS))))))))
Pamala
[size=18]YOU KNOW IM DOING CAKES FOR FREE JUST TO GET MY CAKE ALBUM READY FOR PAYING CUSTOMERS BUT ALL THESE STORIES I HEAR MAKE ME WANNA THINK TWICE . AND I DONT KNOW HOW IM GONNA DO BUT I WAS MAKING THE CAKES FOR MY HUSBANDS FAMILY FOR FREE DURING THE HOLIDAYS WELL THERE COMING UP SOON AND HOW DO I TELL THEM SORRY ITS GONNA COST. THEY ALWAYS VOLUNTEER PEOPLE FOR FOOD AND I ALWAYS VOLUNTEERED FOR CAKES NOW WHAT. ANYWAYS SORRY I GOT OF THE SUBJECT 
YES CAKES LOOK SOOOO EASY BUT THEY ARE NOT THATS WHAT I THOUGHT BEFOR I MADE CAKES BUT THERES ALWAYS GONNA BE THOSE DAM PENNY PINCHER'SS
First of all, why do people think that just because a kitchen is commercial, and undergoes inspection that it is automatically cleaner? There are plenty of home kitchens that would blow away the commercial ones in terms of cleanliness. Just because the commercial kitchen passed (maybe by one point) today, doesn't mean it's just as clean the next day or next week.
And as for the cheapness of customers, I feel you there. The very customer who won't pay $30.oo for a quarter sheet from you, will pay out $45 because it comes from a fancy bakery. It use to tick me off, but I don't give those folks a second thought now. I know how much effort I put into my cakes, as well as the actual expense. Let them by the assembly-line cake. I always get compliments on how fresh my cakes smell and taste. Makes my head so big I can't get it through the door. 
And it's not just our business either. My husband and I both do other work on the side, and it's always the same thing. People always want to whine about the price. Like I said, let them go to the big companies and pay twice as much. It's their loss.
Don't let the turkeys get you down, as they say.
Mickig, you are so right....every business has them. My husband does wood working. He makes furniture (not craftsy stuff). A co-worker wanted a stand to put a 100-gallon fish tank on (imagine the weight of THAT!). Husband did a rough guestimate in the neighborhood of $200. C-worker goes off with "I was thinking about ten bucks!" To hold the weight of 100 gallons of water!!!??? When you lower your price to "be nice" then you diminish your own value. If you had a $50,000 house, you wouldn't sell it for $25,000. Same with your talents.....they are what they are and they are valuable!
lol I had just gotten two cake orders the other day one for an 8 inch chocolate pizza cake that looks like the one in my pictures and the other for a diploma cake.
I worked up the price of $30 for both to be nice giving myself a 5 or 6 dollar profit. (I use box right now because it is easier for me and cheaper, I do make my own adjustments to the mix but for right now it is better)
When I told the person who wanted the pizza cake the price she was shocked and said that it was too much. she than apologized politely saying that she knew that it was made from scratch but that it was too much for her right now. My first thought was you don't want to know the price for a from scratch cake. I told her to think it over and let me know what she could do and I would see if I could compensate. (I am way too nice)
The diploma cake was also shocked but on the other side. She kept asking me if I was getting paid for the cake. In the end she paid me more.
indydebi - that is so funny Quote: [Husband did a rough guestimate in the neighborhood of $200. Co-worker goes off with "I was thinking about ten bucks!"]! Oh ya, try buying enough lumber for 10 bucks what will ya get - - - - two 2x4's. 
Clueless, simply clueless.
The problem as I see it is that our cakes are not big enough to scare them! Take a car for instance, if I need some repair, I don't dicker on price because I want good service and the job done right and no dinging noise when I drive away.
Maybe it is because we don't wear a cake, when I get my hair tinted I do not complain about the price because I don't want to end up bald.
Maybe it isn't important at all, for instance, one of my friends new SIL just got married and doesn't like cake, guess what, that's right she didn't have a wedding cake. I guess to heck with your guests only the brides feelings matter at all.
Honestly, if people really thought about it, the average price of one of my cakes only costs about two weeks of morning coffee at Starbucks. I am obviously too cheap like Starbucks, not big enough and not wearable and according to my friends SIL - expendable.
Edited to make sense.
Tip Top: Re: the bride who didn't have a cake.....
I also offer chocolate fountains and one bride said, "I hear that a lot of weddings are having a chocolate fountain instead of a cake?" I said to her, "You know who started that rumor? The Chocolate manufacturers!!!" I even have a story on my FAQ website page about how the cake is the only food designated as wedding food...... you don't have wedding chicken, you don't have wedding salad, but you DO have wedding CAKE! And the only place to get it is at a wedding. To a lot of people the cake IS the reception and to not have one is just going to blow away and disappoint a lot of your guests.
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