Crazy4Sugar, you are right, the only "profit" I do make is about double my ingredients, which is really not enough I agree. But remember, in my state it is illegal to bake/sell from the home kitchen, so I keep what I charge down a bit. Cookies are always tough for me to price (my cake price has gone up however) for some reason, but from what I see on websites I could charge alot more and still be less than the professional cookie makers - will be rethinking this!

Deb

Deb - ditto on the state rules. I just made my first NFSC cookies and decorated them (I'll try to get pics posted). I took them into the office and sold them for $2.00 a cookies (4 inch cookies) and they sold out in an hour! I was doing this as a fund raiser for my fave charity and now know that I probably could have gone $3 OR $4 each and they still would have sold. Lessons learned! If I get any orders out of it, I'll probably go up to $3 each and explain that I wasn't trying to make a profit for myself the last time...

Deb, I understand your concern; I bake from home too. Nevertheless, I don't see how charging too little money for my work will keep me from getting noticed. Are you thinking that a "legal" baker won't turn you in if you're not making a profit? He/she may be more intent of getting rid of you if you undercut his reasonable prices!

In short, my thinking is that if someone's going to turn me in, or I just get noticed by someone official along the way, it won't save me that I charged less or more than the next gal. If it's just for fun, then don't charge more than ingredients; if it's a business, then charge business prices and don't be ashamed of making a profit by producing a quality product that makes people happy.

Dandelion, I used yellow, orange, brown for base colors. I used the same colors and a bit of dark red for accents. Just lay your base color and dot in the others, then swirl away!

Fun and yummy.

Just got back from a short vacation & am going to bake some cookie w/ my daughter tonight. If they are cute I'll post some pics. Thanks crazy4sugar for your tip!

when i finally thought i was good enough i marched myself online to other comprable work and sold them at that price i sell 2 dollers less to the shops that sell them for me and they are very happy with a 2 doller mark up.i sell them from 4 to 12 dollars each. denise

Well I am going to "test the waters" of pricing my cookies appropriately. I found the mummy cookie design on Wilton that would be quick and easy. The cookie cutter measures 3.5" each way. Being these will be individually wrapped, I will offer them for $3.50 each............if no one bites (for lack of a better word) at this price, well then I won't bother making them. I will also offer the chocolate covered pretzels and the 3-candycovered marshmallow on a stick, all for $1 each. Heck if they would rather spend $1 instead of $3.50 on a holloween treat, all the easier for me. I also will offer chocolate covered sandwich cookies (oreos) for 75 cents each (50 cents seems too little but $1 seems too much). Heck I raised my cake prices, why not the treats too! I mostly only sell to co-workers and close friends anyway.

deb

Quick update on my cookie pricing testing...................today started offering the "mummy" cookies for $3.50 each (individually wrapped), going with the $1 per inch, and they are 3.5 inches tall and wide. I bet if the cookies were priced at $2.50 each they might have sold. So far no one asked, however they are taking me up on the 6 for $5 chocolate covered pretzels. That's ok with me, the pretzels are easier to do!

deb

The cookies my dd & I made this weekend. The dough spread so I had to flatten out the RBC a bit, but they tasted good anyway & I'm not a sugar cookie fan!

I struggle with this too....people have no grasp of the time and energy that goes into decorated cookies so they balk at paying 2-3 dollars for ONE cookie. My husband works at a big plant with a bunch of guys and had an idea that I could make little bags of cookies and sell them to the guys there - he was thinking if I did decorated ones for Halloween or whatever, maybe they would want to pick one up for their kids or something....problem was, he was thinking I would be selling 3" decorated, wrapped MMF cookies for $1!!

I told him, thank you but no friggin' way!! We came to a bit of a compromise - I will make decorated 2.5" cookies and sell them bagged for $2 and then also sell 2 big fat regular cookies for $1 ( like chocolate chip, oatmeal, that sort of thing...) and we can go from there. He also suggested I make a cookie bouquet with some prices because they might want those or the company might want them for corporate gift-giving - which is all well and good but it's hard to price your stuff so your competitive but not giving it away.

I was concerned he would feel funny basically being the one charging that much for one cookie - I told him if he would be embarassed then don't do it. Hate to pass up a great opportunity but If I am spending hours upon hours sweating in the kitchen for $2 an hour after cost, what is the bloody point?