I have a client who wants me to decorate an Elmo cake and an Abby Cadabby cake. Also wants 50 Elmo cuppies and 50 Abby cuppies. She has purchased the Elmo pan and the Abby pan herself. She has also purchased the cupcake liners, the candy she wants used to top the cuppies.

Basically she is supplying EVERYTHING but the cake and icing ingredients. She just wants me to bake and decorate them because she has 2 children (age 1 and 2) and her third child is due within 2 weeks of this party.

SO... #1 - Can I do it? I see it as I am not selling her character cakes because she purchased all the licensed supplies. She is simply paying for my time.

and #2 - How should I charge? By the hour? By the serving? Should I reduce the price of the cuupies since ahe is supplying the liners and the candy?

What do you all think?

Anyone?

I can't help but would be oh SO interested to see what others would say so will give you a bump

Thx... I appreciate it!

Ok so I have no idea if it was legal but the owner of a catering company I worked at did take orders for character pan cakes. She made the client buy the pan and she kept the pan. I doubt it was legal but I just worked there. Sorry I was not much help.

Thx anyway, Jodi. You did bring up another issue that might affect the answer, though. I will NOT be keeping the pans. They are her property and will be returned to her. I am only doing the baking/decorating.

Another thing I thought of... I know the Abby pan says "Home use only" but the Elmo is a 1996 retired pan and it does not have this disclaimer on it.

If any of that makes a difference.

Yeah...I would do it but I would still charge for your time to decorate and the ingredients even though she bought the pans.I charge $50.00 for a character cake so I would still charge $30.00 even if she supplied the stuff because character cakes take a long time to decorate due to the color changes...baking time....and ingredients to bake and make the icing.The cupcakes I would charge at least $1.00 for. HTH

I would do it, but charge just the same as if I was using my pans, you have pans, if she wants to buy extra thats her choice but you charge what you charge, if you want to discount the prince of the papers, I think it would look good at no extra cost for you, but you are charging mostly for your time, not for the use of your pans

I wouldn't. It doesn't matter who bought the pans, it's the money you are making from the order that makes it not legal. If she bought the pans and you were *giving* her the cakes/cuppies for free then that's one thing, but if she is paying you for the cakes/cuppies then it's not legit. You are reproducing an image of Elmo and Abby Cadabby for profit... there's no grey area there and if by some chance you ended up in court... you would lose. Now will it get to that point... probably not, but you asked. If the cuppies will have Elmo and Abby candies on them, then that is fine, but the character pans are a no no and I am willing to bet that the Elmo pan had "for home use only" written on the packaing somewhere and even if it didn't, Elmo is a licensed character and da rulz apply.

I won't touch licensed stuff with a 10 foot pole. I've lost business because of it, but I have no problem letting someone else take that fall.

I love this place! Thank you all for your replies. You've been a wealth of knowledge and info.

I would do it but PLEASE charge for your time and aggrevation,this is alot of work.I can't get too technical on the copyright stuff but as I see it all of the products you are using are licensed so the company has made their money off this already.The character pan on it says for home use only,this is for her family she bought it I don't see why not ?

I can't tell you all how much I appreciate your input.
I think I am going to do it. I'll charge her a higher than usual price for the cuppies (decorated with a crayon for Elmo and a wand for Abby - so no © issue there) and list her the character cakes as "FREE" on the invoice.