I have a picture of a penis cake on my website under the adult cakes and here is an email i received from a lady that has ordered a few cakes from me

I need your help please. I went on your web site with my husband last night to show him which bunny cake I had picked out. He really like it Then he asked me to click on other cakes. Well......I made a mistake and clicked on the adult cakes thinking it would be purses and the nurse cake and stuff like that. Welll..... you know which cake was first right? Yeah, Kevin was not at all please with the porno cake with the man parts. He said I didn't need to order my bunny cake from you. We had an adult discussion and I told him I would still like to get the cake from you but I would also talk to you about what you have available for everyone to view. I understand that you have some people who might enjoy those kinds of cake but I have recommended alot of people to you. I really enjoy your cakes and they are delicious. I would be truely embarrased if one of my friends went on the site and saw that cake or anything like that. So.....is there any way you can take that off your web site and put something like other cakes are available upon specific requests? I hope you don't get offended by me asking but it was just heavy on my heart. Thanks for understanding. I hope I hear from you soon. Have a great night.

Yes, I know it may offend some people, but if i had to cater to everyone i might offend, i would be able to do any cakes. Some one could be offend by a cake with a cross or a beer cooler cake. How should i approach this?

How often are you asked to make "adult" cakes? Would this lady and her business be more lucrative than the number of adults cakes you might make?

Can you still do adult cakes, just not display them?

I have never been asked to do an adult cake, that is why I ask if the orders you would get from them would make up for the ones you could potentially lose.

I agree with your former customer. If this cake is just in a gallery with other cakes, and not in an "adult" themes gallery it is harmful. If it is in a separate gallery, I would make that gallery harder to access with an extra step-a warning that the viewer is about to access an "adult" area.

Let me ask you first - the tab is titled Adult Cakes - does it have like a warning referencing that particular section might not be suitable for everyone as it contains adult content? If not, you may want to think about adding it - again, that's if you want - because bottom line, it's your website and to your point what offends one person may be okay for someone else and ultimately, you cannot allow anyone to dictate what you put on your website.

If you like your website as it is and are comfortable with ith, just send her a note saying that you are sorry that she was offended but that you have never had an issue before, as there is a market for "fun, adult" cakes and that though you appreciate her as a customer, you would prefer not to have your website censored and give your example about the religious cakes.

Is it clearly marked that these are ADULT cakes 18+ do not enter if you don't want to see this type of material?

My thought is that it's none of their business. This is your business and you can't please everyone. If you want to do adult cakes then do them and display them. You might want to think about having a separate site for them and having a link on your main site and having it very clearly marked that this is a link to adult cakes of what could be considered pornographic nature and stress the 18+. If it just says "Adult Cakes" some might not make that immediate connection (as she clearly didn't).

(please read this with a tone of kindness) You are very lucky that she sent you such a kind email and you are hearing her thoughts about this. Many people, myself included, would have felt too uncomfortable to tell you and just stopped doing business with you, and stopped making the recommendations. Perhaps telling their friends that they made a mistake when they made a past recommendation. She is giving you the opportunity to keep her business and the business of those that you did not know would feel this way. There are probably many, many more than you think.

I have to say that I was surprised when I clicked this post and saw the first sentence. I thought there should have been some kind of warning in the subject line regarding the content. I wasn't even going to respond, but i figured that most people were going to respond and say some unkind things about your customer, and that is not so helpful to your business.

Maybe if you write something like *warning, adult content* just below your link that says adult cakes, that kight give an inclination as to what is there. I would have thought the same thing as your customer regarding what your link meant. When people don't think in certain terms regularly, the words don't always mean the same.

I don't know how you can fix the problem. You probably cannot. If you want to be able to show people that you make those kind of cakes, then just know that some of you customers may not like it and leave. At lest you will not be surprised now and just don't take it personally.

I have seen sites where there is a pop up window and a code that you have to type into it to see the Adult Cakes on the Website, also has it stated that there may be some images that could offend some viewers and that you should be 18 yrs. old to view these cakes, no way to regulate that, but at least they do not just pop up when the site is opened. The gallery is also labled "X Adult X"

If you could do something like this with your website it might help. I agree that for some it can be offensive, I keep the Adult section locked here on CC so that anyone viewing cakes with me won't get a shock if they come scrolling across the most saved or recent photos. I have to admit, not much offends me and when I see ADULT cakes, I pretty much know what I am going to see, but by having it locked, it is my choice to see them or not.

It would be ashamed to loose customers over this, hope you can find a way to get around it.

Er, this is the south, the bible belt, blue code country (yeah, Carolina girl here...eyeroll), aka the stoneage

Take lillmissbakesalot's advice and link the adult cakes to a secondary page. Personally, I would not have adult cake photos simply because down here you won't just offend one woman, you'll offend her preacher, the church, her bible study group, her book reading club, the youth ministry and even her pet Yorkie. (My 58 year old mother won't even say penis, look at that, I had to add penis to my Droid's dictionary...smartphone my butt).

LOL... I am envisioning little old church ladies washing their eyes out with holy water and saying some hail Mary's. Then heading out in droves to warn the world about cake dongs...


HAHAHAHAH!!!!

Uhmm, her husband doesn't want the cake now?

Never had a playboy magazine in his hand his whole life?

As long as the part of your website is labelled adult, it should be enough.

I always thought freedom of speech (and therefore of thought) was important in the States, not censorship, as it is here where I live, behing the great firewall

I would have a second site with another name. No association. You will lose more business than you will ever gain.

I love that they had to have an adult conversation.

I'm not easily offended, so the whole penis word in the first sentence here doesn't offend me. While there are some minors on this board, I do feel that the majority of us are adults, so lets talk like adults.

While I'm not easily offended I do get that some people are more uptight, and that may have been a shock. I can also sorta seeing that Adult could be taken the wrong way, since alot of people do have a 'kids' cake section. If you have no problem doing these cakes and having it known that you do them, then keep a place for them on your website.

What I would suggest doing though, is instead of the tab taking you directly to the pictures have it take you to a disclaimer page and then having a link there for them to click on the pictures. That way if it isn't what they thought they do have a chance to x out before they get offended.

If you feel comfortable doing those types of cakes, and someone doesn't want to order from you because of it, then honestly that is their problem. If you get enough orders otherwise, I wouldn't be concerned about it myself.

I think I would rather deal with someone that is honest and upfront about it than someone that hides that they do 'naughty' cakes cause it might offend someone.

Definitely put it in a "Adult" section. I know parents who look at the sites looking for cakes with their children. However real or part of life it may be, it should not be there for younger eyes to see. I really don't care to look at that sort of thing either, so I would just navigate away and go to another site to look.

Although half the world's population has a penis, it is innevitable that there will be some people who are offended by it. It annoys me, but it's a fact of life. Some people are raised in more liberal families where they feel more comfortable with things like that. I think as a business owner you need to respect the fact that you will have all sorts of customers, and ensure that even the most conservative ones won't be offended, even if you can't relate to them.

Well it *was* in a section labled "Adult", but the customer made the mistake of thinking that it meant adult themed cakes like hand bags and thing like that. As in adult vs kids parties.

I think this could easily be remedied by having two clicks to get to the naughty cake section. Have a page come up when you click on "Adult Cakes" that says:

"You are about to enter our naughty cake section. You should be 18 years of age or older to view these cakes. If you are not 18 years or older, or do not wisj to see the cakes click here. If you wish to enter our naughty cakes gallery click here."

Simple and to the point and it give the customer the chance to back out should they not want to see them or misunderstood what "Adult Cakes" meant.

The bottom line is that this section will absolutely negatively affect your business. Why would you do anything to offend potential customers when the solution of a second site is so simple? Your call. Are you a business making business decisions or a woman standing on principles?

im very liberal, and comfortable with all things sexual. that being said i do not post my adult cakes on my site because they can be seen by anyone.

I do not post pics of adult cakes on my website or facebook, when people inquire about them I have a PDF with the adult pics that I will then email to them.

"Penis cake lady"

Thanks for a much needed laugh!

Her husband was probably offended that the cake looked better than he did

Depending on how many of the naughty cakes you sell, you can make the determination of how to handle them (pun intended.) There are entire businesses that make a living off of naughty/poor taste cakes (how many cat litter box cakes are there on this site, and I don't hear anyone complaining about that.) You should definitely make it clear somehow on your site that the subject matter is adults-only so that the ones who would be offended can make sure to really study those pages the most.

Ugh, how naive are these people to not know what "adult cakes" means and to blame you for the mistake? Anyhoo, I was worried about the exact same thing on my site. So the "adult cakes" link takes you to a plain text page with three more links:

I am over 18, adult in nature blah blah blah PROCEED

I am under 18 BACK TO HOME

and

I am under 18 but going to click over 18 anyway PROCEED

(because c'mon WHO is this stopping really? lol)

Better to do something like this to clarify but it's YOUR site and don't you dare take the photos down.

If the option of not putting a second page to actually view your pictures is available you should put something like this up "Pictures contained in this folder are for Adult views only. This folder is not managed and we ("insert company's name here") are not responsible for children under 18 viewing pictures."

LOL I really love how she put they had to have an adult conversation...as opposed to have a kid conversation.

I'm not offended by cake art. I know some are and some bakers do not accept orders of this nature. I personally wouldn't go out of my way. It sounds like her husband was the one who didn't like what he saw.

If kids are learning about anatomy from cake websites, they're going to be really confused when they're faced with the real thing. And what if they see a TWINKIE in the store! *Gasp!* Better get the smelling salts! Those are WAYYYY too suggestive!

Why not just change the gallery name to "Naughty Cakes"? Avoids confusion, if someone doesn't want to see "Naughty Cakes" they don't click.

Sigh. Folks are way to uptight .... It's cake for the love of Mike.

I'm pretty sure the kids go straight to the "real" sex sites.

I still think that a different site with a different name would be most beneficial. It would probably give you more freedom on the adult site and the search could be enhanced. Not to mention the customers that would have been offended do not have to know. Many people own more than one business. We own four.