How do you figure them out? After cutting a bunch of cake away how do you price the cake according to servings? Or is it more of a "per cake" price with these?

I have been asked to make a carved fish cake that I guess would be 2-D since it is on a cake board but has fins and tail sticking out away from the cake.

It's always a hard call but I charge per cake. Unless you can reuse the scraps it's just wasted. There's always the cake balls but unless you have a shop where you can sell them then it's hard to get rid of them, of course there is always eating them yourself! LOL

I have seen most people do by serving. Most people need ## servings so you would have to plan your cake accordingly. I just did an airplane cake, I gave them a little more than they asked for because that's how it worked out, but I planned the cake to be about 18 inches of cake long and 3 inches wide. Some parts they could get more servings out of because it was 4-5 inches tall, and some less. I figured as much as I could ahead to get 20-25 servings. This is approximately what they got - I think it is all about the planning.

Oh, O.k, thanks, that is what I was thinking. They want it to feed 30 people and that is all that will be served, so I need to make sure there is enough cake. I suppose I could always place it on another single sheet cake too if the fish isn't enough by itself.

Yeah, I would figure out how thick it will be approximately, and then that will tell you how big the cuts will be - 1x2, 2x2, 2x3, etc. For example: If it's not very tall in some places they may need to cut wider pieces to get a serving of cake, but if it is 3 inches tall in some spots they may only need to cut a 1x2 inch slice! It's hard to know ahead exactly what it will be, but try to measure it out on paper or posterboard - that always helps me!

I would think you could make a 30 serving fish, but if not a small extra undecorated cake works. I stuck a sheet under my airplane because they actually needed 50 servings, which would be CRAZY big for an airplane!! lol