AHi guys, I am having my first market stall in a few weeks. I will be selling cupcakes and cake pops. Can some one please tell me now many different cupcakes flavors are suitable and which ones are the most popular? Any tips on market stalls? TIA

Hello and congrats on your first market stall! I just attended my first craft fair and sold out of Maple Bacon. I had 7 varieties: Lemon Creme, Twix Fix, Andes Dream, 24 Carrot, Maple Bacon, Double Chocolate and Very Vanilla. Biggest sellers were Maple Bacon, Andes Dream and Lemon Creme. Double Chocolate didnt sell very well so my next event will not have basic cupcakes but only gourmet varieties.

I did a lot of research before my first stall and the best tips I found were: a) advertise around the market (I chose entrance doors and restrooms); b) have a giveaway (I held a drawing for a cupcake bouquet. This in turn gives you a ton of email addresses to help your future marketing) and c) the biggest draw to my booth was free samples. I used an apple slicer and had 9 pretty little bites per cupcake to give out on mini liners. I had so much fun I am doing a major event (over 50,000 people) in May.

Good luck to you! If you need more info I will be happy to share, just inbox me. HTH!!

Hi DaisyCakesNJ,

Just wondering did you do the event for 50,000 in the end as I have a similar event coming up and could really use some advice!

I.e, how many cupcakes to make so you don't make a loss and also where to store all those cupcakes as there is only a table, marquee and a space of 2m by 2m..Do you keep them under the table? And how? Also how would you suggest getting them to the venue?

Thanks!

AHi Marbie,

I haven't done that event yet of 50,000 people but some serious thought had gone in to prepping. I learned a lot from the event that had about 1,000 people and am happy to share.

I plan on freezing 90% of my product and keeping the frozen ones in wheeled coolers with ice (perhaps dry ice if I'm careful). Best place is under the table as it sounds like your space is limited.

AHey, I do 3-4 events a week. The bigger events 5000 plus I take 10% of the expected footfall each day. So if its 5000 people over two days I'd take 1000 cupcakes. I make the sponge 72/48 hrs in and advance and ice in the last 24. I don't like to freeze so stay up all night if necessary. I used pizza dough trays which pizza restaurants use to store unopened dough balls, they're about 5" deep and hold approx 40 cakes they're ideal to stack and then yes stack them under the table and take someone to help!

Good luck, LDC x

Id love to one day do a market stall ;-) sounds like so much fun...but hard work good luck x

Hi Daisycakes,

Was just wondering if you had your event for 50,000 people yet and how many you baked / sold?

I have an event with 10,000 people next weekend and havent a clue - eek!

Thanks,

Sophie 

I do a good number of festivals with the dessert truck.  10% of the attendees eating dessert is a very good rule of thumb.

I possibly have an opportunity to set up in the food area of the Naval hospital and I have no idea how many to make.....They take 20% of your profits....so I really need to keep track of what time and money goes into making each flavor. Thanks Daisycakes for the tips...especially on what flavors sold.Maple bacon, huh? That just sounds gross to me...lol

I do a lot of festivals and events with revenue shares.  I've never had one specify 20% of profit.  They always take a % of sales.

AI'm sure they meant sales, not profit. It's way too easy for a vendor to fudge the numbers and come up with an unrealistically low number for profit.

You are probably right. Calling her right now.

Hi, i'm thinking about opening a dessert stall but was wondering how you kept your desserts cool. Especially desserts with chocolate and cream

thanks :)