Did I Overcharge For This Cake??? (Warning: A Little Long)
Business By Sugar_Plum_Fairy Updated 19 Jun 2007 , 2:29pm by Schmoop
I made a cake for a woman whose son was graduating H.S. It was for Saturday the 16th. She was impressed with my other cakes for our daughters' Brownie troop. Also, the fact that I took the time to e-mail and call her with questions because her daughter is highly allergic to milk.
Her son happens to be allergic to eggs, milk and peanuts and I had to do a couple of trial runs using the Ener-G egg replacer. I found that it made my scratch cake way too dense and then I found out that DH has a cake mix that would be okay for him instead of ordering from Cherrybrook. I just added an extender that was dairy and egg free. The cake served 60 and working with the margarine buttercream icing was rather annoying. Not at all the same consistency as regular BC. I also purchased a mold and molded the MMF for the decorations around the base cake (and painted them too, with little touches of color gel on the footballs, basketballs and baseballs - the strings, lines and stitching, respectively). The mortarboard is gumpaste as it the tassle. edited to add photo and: The Nitney (sp?) lions and the Mountie mascot are edible images!
Okay, I charged $160. Was this too much? She didn't seem to mind.
P.S. I live in a hoighty-toighty town less than 15 minutes away from Trump National Golfcourse and less than 80 minutes from NYC. The average price of cakes in bakeries around here seems to be $2.25 a slice.
Thanks.
with all the custom work and custom baking to fit allergies....
you most certainly did NOT overcharge.
and remember, you comparison to local bakeries at $2.25/slice would make that cake $150 --- but that's for a cake he couldn't eat
so, a $10 surcharge to get it to fit his allergies -- well that seems low to me.
and those bakeries would most likely have used plastic for the sports items and the grad hat etc.
and they wouldn't have done the books...
so .....long winded way of saying
That lady got a Steal of a Deal!
Gorgeous cake!!! Personally, I would have charged $240 for that - lots of detailed work and what sounds to be a real PITA cake to make - so no, you didn't overcharge!!!
I don't think that you charged too much. I mean, considering all you had to do to make sure your product met her childrens' diet needs, and was enough to feed 60 people and everything else... I'd say that the price you charged is right.
It looks great! I'm doing a stacked book today, and I hope it looks even half as good as yours! I'm in NJ, too, and with this heat...UGH!
You did not overcharge. Very fair price, not to mention all the consideration you put into the food restrictions. Glad the customer was happy!
Suzette
i don't think you overcharged at all. those are hard allergies to over come in baking and you did it and it came out great! I would have paid that much for it, probably more, seeing as you cateered to the allergies of the children. I live in ct so i know how much these things can be in the tri-state area. If she would have went somewhere around here they would have charged her alot more, or flat out told her no,.
excellent work. looks like you have a life long customer
I don't think you charged too much either. That was a lot of detail, and it looked great! You went through alot of trouble to accomodate the special needs. Many bakeries wouldn't have even done that.
I'm sure they loved it, and were happy to get it for that price.
No way! That cake is beautiful, plus you put so much extra work into it. I am sure no one would blink if you charged at least $200.00 down here (South Floridas) and I'm sure the market in New Jersey commands the same prices.
Thank you so much (and for answering so quickly!!!)!
I posted this cake on another site and was questioned about the price. Granted the questioner is from Russia, but her cakes are so much better than mine and obviously she doesn't get that much for them. I started to second guess myself. Of course my hubby is no help at all. "I don't know what they go for" is all I can get out of him.
I know if it was a client that was referred to me that I hadn't met before the price would probably be more than fair, but since I've met this woman a few times and our daughters are in the same class and Brownie Troop I wanted to give her a little break, so I hope that was a fair price. She didn't question it at all, but I am waiting to hear from her regarding how it was taste-wise.
Guess I'm a bit nervous as this is only my 2nd customer and 3rd paid cake.
Even IF it was too much for the cake, if you can get someone to pay for it, then it wasn't. Supply and Demand. 
But I don't think it was too much, Congrats!
Great Job on the cake and I don't think you charged too much. I have a question about your cake recipe and buttercream. My kids are diary and egg free...when i use the egg replacer, the cake gets quite crumbly, can you tell me how you made your cake? As far as the buttercream, what margarine did you use? I know there are only several margarines that are truely dairy free, like Nucoa brand and I cannot get a good consistency with them. Any reccommendations from your experience with this project???
I do not believe you overcharged; the Client was pleased, you took extra care to insure that her needs and requirements were met, and you did a terrific job. I would say that if you are happy with what you were able to get from the job, then you were spot on.
HTH (and nice job, by the way!),
Odessa
Great Job on the cake and I don't think you charged too much. I have a question about your cake recipe and buttercream. My kids are diary and egg free...when i use the egg replacer, the cake gets quite crumbly, can you tell me how you made your cake? As far as the buttercream, what margarine did you use? I know there are only several margarines that are truely dairy free, like Nucoa brand and I cannot get a good consistency with them. Any reccommendations from your experience with this project???
I used the DH Moist Deluxe Classic Yellow cake mix and followed the directions to that, except that I almost always substitute oil with unsweetened applesauce. For the eggs I followed the directions on the box of Ener-G and made sure to add that last. The cake extender I used was from this site. I usually write down whomever supplied a recipe or tip so I can credit them, but didn't this time (sorry). Here's the extender I used: 1 c flour, 3/4 c sugar, 2/3 c milk or water, 1/2 c oil and 1 tsp baking powder.
For the icing I used Janette's recipe. I just substituted the butter with Fleischmann's Unsalted margarine. (2c butter - room temp., 2 c Crisco, 4 tsp. vanilla extract, 2 tsp. almond extract (I used chocolate extract instead), 1/4 c flour, 3 lbs of Confect. sugar - 12 c (I used less, probably about half this amount and I thought it was sweet enough, esp for someone not used to eating cake!), 2-4 Tblsp milk).
Oh, and I forgot to mention in my original post two things. If milk is needed I used rice milk since I had it for a cake I had done for his sister. And for the filling I made the raspberry filling using merissa's recipe from this site.
HTH
I have used the soy for one of the cakes I did for the sister of the graduate. It seemed fine. I did purposely buy the rice milk this time because the mom had mentioned to me that that is what her daughter uses on her cereal at home, so I figured of the two I would rather use something their bodies are familiar with for all future cakes.
Soy milk cooks fine in cakes. It is a great subsitute for milk in almost all recipes. However...if the milk is one of the ingrediants required for the recipe to thicken (such as pudding) it won't work and you'll end up with a soupy consistency.
I have a milk-allergy myself.
When a recipe calls for milk, I will use Mocha Mix creamer (one of the very few true dairy free non dairy mixers). It is thicker/heavier than milk, so if a recipe calls for say 1 cup milk, I use 1/2 cup of water and 1/2 a cup of Mocha Mix. It adds a nice flavor and richness to cakes.
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