Okay I Need Pricing Help For This Wedding Cake! Please
Decorating By jo_ann Updated 22 Oct 2006 , 4:00am by jo_ann
I had a consultation with a bride and her mother today. She wants the cakes out of the Wilton Wedding Cakes A Romatic Portfolio Book on page 38. But she does not want the curls or snowflakes on it. Instead she wants red, gold and yellow gumpaste calla lilies on each. She wants 5 16" rounds. 2 of them diabetic carrot cake with diabetic cream cheese icing. 1 chocolate mayonaisse cake, 1 banana nut (diabetic) cake and one white cake. The last 3 are with fillings of my choice. She will provide the stands for the cakes. Her budget for the 5 cakes is $500.00. 
And she expecting a maximum of 500 people. I had quoted her a price of $2.00 a serving. Thats with the fondant and gumpaste calla lilies. What would you have charged. Help I told her I would see what we could do and would get back to her by Thursday morning with a final quote.
Well i dont know if that would feed 500 people, but I guess the question is would you be willing to make a 16 inch cake for $100 each? Or maybe if it is a little out of her budget you could make and decorate 2 or 3 of the cakes and do a couple in sheet cakes in back just for serving. Just a thought.
I don't know where you live but I'm in the Seattle area and I would charge $4.00 per serving for this cake (fondant covered, premium flavors and premium frosting, fondant flowers).
Jacqui
Here is the other question...does she really want that much diabetic cake? Seems like a lot.
I agree that 5 rounds are not going to feed 500 people so if i were you I would estimate how many people you think 5 rounds would feed and if 2 dollars a slice is what you would normally charge then go with that if its still to much out of her budget (500 is pretty stingy for a wedding cake) then talk to her about maybe removing the fillings or adding pretty details other than gum paste and more costly things.
I would suggest dummy cakes or a smaller cake out and sheets in the back for that price. That is a LOT of guests, lots of flavors and lots of cake for you to make. $500 is a very low price for all of that work. According to the Wilton guide it would serve 500 with 5 16" rounds but.. how about three on display bananna, choc and white and the diabetic carrots as sheets in the back?
Good luck, it is a pretty cake in the book!
Tracy
They definitely want those 3 cakes to be diabetic. And according to the Wilton book (for which she is going by) each 16" double layer cake will feed 100 people. Of course I explained to her about the size of the slices. Oh and I forgot she wants 100 candy calla lilies as favors. I don't know why 100 when she expects 500 people but that's what she wants. I think she's also having other favors made.
I have to agree that she is expecting too much and being a little cheap for this cake. At a bear minimum, and feeling totally robbed and taken advantage of , I'd have to say $2.00 a slice, but that's still double her budget at 500 people. Seems like a whole heck of a lot of work for $500!!! Perhaps she should consider doing something simpler or nix the fondant and do it in buttercream instead. I agree that the idea of having the large sheet cakes to cut up in the back is a great idea.
For the cakes alone it would be $1000 (500 servings @ $2 each), THEN you have to factor in gumpaste flowers. Calla's aren't the hardest flower, but it's still time consuming. Multiply that by the fact that she might want 5 toppers since they are on seperate stands. AND THEN each cake is 16" so you have to do a larger topper so it looks to scale. I mean if you made a topper for a 6" tier & put it on a 16" it just isn't going to look good at all. I charge seperately for gumpaste flowers & the last calla lily topper I did on a 6" top tier cost them $40.
If this lady is expecting all of these special flavors, gumpaste flowers & cake to feed 500 for $500 I say RUN the other way.
Okay I'm going to talk to her about the dummies and sheet cakes. She definitely wants one of those carrot cakes real though. That's the one they're going to cut. Thanks for all the ideas. I think the dummies are a great idea. I would lower the price for that. Do you think it would be tacky to tell her that the dummies come back to me to use as a display?
If you are charging her $500 for enough cake to feed 500 nothing you ask of her as far as returning cakes is tacky. It's still going to take you all that time and the icing materials to do the cakes.
I don't see how she can expect even sheet cakes for that price in anything but white cake and plain icing.
I live in the middle of nowhere and the last time I sold sheet cakes I charged $1.30 a serving with no filling for a 2x2 piece.
I don't think it would be tacky "rent" her the custom dummies, and expect their return.
When my older son and his wife got married, they ordered large silk flower arrangements on wicker stands (for decorating the gazebo entrance; they were married in a park) that were supposed to be customized to their wedding colors.
Guess what - the flowers that were the "display" at the florist's shop WERE the flowers that were delivered to their wedding site. 
If you want the "cake dummies" back, charge her a "rental deposit fee" and let her know once your items are returned she will ge her entire depoit back. Give her set dates. Example, if she returns your items within 5 days after the wedding the entire deposit is returned. If they are returned within 5-7 days after then 50 percent is returned and after that they are hers.
Jacqui
Are you considering the fact that the diabetic cakes cost MORE to make? They do.
And, as the ladies above have said, if you want your dummies back--get 'em!
I think you'll regret this once you get into it, though. Seems like WAAaay too much work for just $500.
In my opinion, you'll be lucky to come out even, once you consider all the ingredients and time you'll be spending on this one!
I wish you the very best, but my advice would be to RUN from this order.
--Knox--
The more I think about it the more I agree with knoxcop1. I think I'm going to stick to my earlier quote which I think is still low. $2.00 a serving and that includes the candy clla lily favors. And she can take it or go find someone else to make it. I'll let you know how it goes on Thursday.
Is she crazy?!!! I've had this kind of limitation imposed on me before and believe me, she's going to be the only one winning!
You have to do four flavors ( HAVE you done diabetic cakes before?), cover them in FONDANT, and make gumpaste flowers!!! And is she going to pay extra for the 100 favors?
Customers like her put us against the wall because we want to please plus we don't want to lose the order, either. I would charge $3.00 minimum per serving. Why is she being so cheap with her cake when obviously, she's being so extravagant in wanting 500 people to join her on that special day?
I sincerely wish you luck!
Marie
I think she is expecting an awful lot for very little. She is having a lot of specialty flavors and fillings which I would charge more than $2 per serving for that. And you have to do all the calla lilies. I would stick to the original quote. And definately charge for the dummy rental and get them back. You should have something pretty to display after all that work. Honestly, people don't realize what goes into these cakes. I am also dealing right now with someone who wants the moon and doesn't want to pay much for it. I'm ready to tell her to bake her own darn cake!! Hope yours turns out well and that you get paid what you're worth!
I agree with everyone that you are not charging enough for the amount of work the woman expects. Being a former diabetic myself I know that it is definatley going to cost more to make those as you have to use the artificial sugar which is very expensive compared to regular sugar. And personally if she is having 500 guests well this to me sounds like an expensive wedding to start with so to me $2, a slice sounds reasonable. As was stated in many threads they always spends thousands on everything else for the wedding but expect way to much in the way of the cake for very little money.
I think that this bride needs to get her head checked out!!!! If she expects you to such a huge cake for next to nothing!!
For the update;
I had another meeting with the bride and let her know that there was no way I could lower my price below the $1000.00 quote and for that she would have to go with silk flowers that she purchased. I sugested that she priced other decorators and that if she decides to go with me then I needed confirmation and signing of a contract by Nov. 1st.
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