After months and months of advertising I receive a message from a wedding planner wanting a quote on a cake. I looked at the picture and nearly had a heart attack, it was a monsterous wedding cake of 9 tiers and stair case bridges and sugar flowers. I gave her a quote a couple of days ago but part of me hopes they won't choose me to do the wedding cake as the thought of doing my first wedding cake with 9 tiers is very daunting. At the same time, I don't want to seem unprofessional. What if she gets back to me and wants me to make it? How can I say No without causing any misunderstanding. She might never want to contact me again for a quote which is what I am worried about. What can I say? I have had a sudden booking on that particular date? If I say that, she will ask me why I didn't inform her etc.. ????
I took a peek at your photos .. you will be fine. Get some help if you can.. start practicing the flowers, and then just do it .. think of it as three ,3 tiered cakes , you dont seem to have any problem with those . I would not back out of the request , you have advertised and promoted your business now you have an interested client ,so go with it. If you dont, word may get out that you are not skilled enough to do what you are promoting and that will hinder the growth of your business. Mke sure you get a signed contract and a non-refundable deposit to reserve the date .
The thing is, I work part time from monday to wed in the office and thursday work at home. Friday I have free. Friday will be for decorating. How can I plan the baking during the week? Do I start on the large cakes first or the small ones?
Make sure you price accordingly too! Most wedding planners I have dealt with are looking for a really good deal. So if you worried about doing the cake or not looking professional because you don't really want to take this order then just give her a higher quote. Or tell her you are already booked for that particular date. I do agree your pictures look great! 1st weddings are always stressful. Heck any wedding is!
Go for it! You can do it by the looks of your photos. Bake a week or 2 before and freeze, then you won't have so much pressure that week. Calebymilan is right, you are capable of doing it. You can bake in any order. I like to get the large ones out of the way first, but it doesn't matter which ones you do first. Good luck and have fun doing it!
You lot give me so much moral, thank you very much. 
I freezer is tiny, maybe I could use someone elses freezer. How long do they take to defrost? They have to defrost so I can put the filling in.
I usually take out frozen layers the night before, but I have taken them out in the a.m. and they just take a couple hours, depending on the temp of your house. Leave covered til completely thawed.
Make as much as you can ahead of time, flowers, icing etc.
Hi there =)
That's happened to me before, but honestly, if I feel that I can't make the cake due to lack of experience I advise the customer of that. I'm always honest and tell him/her that I do not have experience in certain areas of cake decorating (i.e. fondant figures). While some may disagree and feel that I am turning away business by doing this, I feel that it's actually saving me trouble (and headaches!) in the end.
Believe it or not, I've actually had customers appreciate the honesty and ended up placing an order anyways.
You've already quoted her a price, so in her mind she feels that you are confident that you can do this. I agree with the others, just practice and schedule your baking well and you should be good to go.
Plus, you always have Cake Central for help! 
Good luck and have a great weekend!!
~N
freeze the cakes.........personally I would take out 3 cakes at a time starting on Wed. am. By Wed. night, ice those 3 cakes, set aside. Thursday am 3 more cakes, ice on Thursday night. Then Friday same thing, Ice the last three Friday night and then decorate all cakes.
The flowers you could have done weeks in advance, or even order them online if you didn't feel you had the extra time.
The fact is you should be charging enough that this is worth your while to spend an entire WEEK making the cake. Once you're done and it's a success you'll be so tickled with yourself and imagine the look on people's faces when you say "I've only done ONE wedding cake professionally, here it is" and they see it's that BIG ol' thing!!!! lol
Once you conquer this, there's nothing you can't accomplish. Chances are you won't have anyone with a 10 tiered cake next lol
easier said then done, I have to keep on going to the house where I am using the fridge. Also, in the Uk some of our cakes are rich fruit cakes which are traditionally soaked in brandy. The brandy will help to preserve it I would need to 'feed' it every week with more brandy. I hope that if I do this cake, they will choose mostly fruit cake as I don't have to freeze them.
Its a good idea to order the flowers from someone else. Don't they get damaged in transport?
yes, she definitely wants that many even though its too much.
MissCakeCrazy - Honestly, your cakes are great and we all think you can do it. However, the bottom line is that you really don't want to do this cake - no matter how many options are available to you and you know what, that's okay. You don't have to do it - period. If the planner calls back just say that you are unsure if you could create that particular cake to the customer's satisfaction or you can also say that you have booked a couple cakes since giving her the quote and are unable to do it. Simple. Don't stress about it. You are the one that would be doing this cake and if you take on the job not really wanting to, then it's going to be very stressful for you.
The wedding planner still hasn't gotten back to me anyway, I was going to e-mail her and ask her if the bride has made a decision but I think I'll just wait for her to get in touch with me.
I'm more worried that you have under quoted the cake, which deep down you know and its why you are now hesitant about doing it (hey, I've done that myself on more than one occasion!). What was the price you quoted her and can you post the picture she sent you so we can see it? xxx
I quoted £1,500 (the cost of the stand was included in this quote too for £360). I don't know how to attch a photo in this post?
Well, if you decide you really don't want to do it, you could always say you're now booked for that date.
You'd be surprised how many times I've been booked, when I'm not really! 
I have a complete and utter mental block when it comes to doing a cake shaped into a car. Just can't do it. So, I always I apologise that I'm fully booked on that date!
So approx 268 servings over £1500 is only £5.60 per serving. I haven't seen the design, but I think I would charge around £8.00 per serving, it sounds a tremendous amount of work and you will have to buy specialist stuff for it (bridges etc), those I would definitely charge full price for as I wouldn't want them back to use again (personally hate that look lol!).
If she is ordering more cake than what she needs because she likes the "look", you could decorate some dummy (styrofoam) cakes. I'm not sure what the charge is for that, but they could be decorated in advance.
Thats what I originally recommended but she definitely wants all that cake
Quote by @%username% on %date%
%body%