AI have a simple 8in cake due next month, it's going to be white with blue stripes with a Yankee design on top. All in Fondant, I already gave a quote of 45.00. But for future orders how do I go about charging for each design like stripes, circles, ribbon , balls, swirls, etc. I'm re-doing my price list because I had set prices but now I want to add to it because people are not understanding that my prices are "Starting" prices, I just need help on pricing for details (I rather do fondant than buttercream, it's just easier for me.)

AYou need to figure out your pricing structure so you can justify charging what you charge and be firm. It depends on time, detail, and materials. You can put that right on your website, some people charge more for 'premium' flavors, add on fondant, etc. You need to have an accurate idea of how long it takes you to complete a design before you can charge for it.

I would stop taking orders until you get this in order. There are many threads about pricing and Jason has a pricing website that will help. You can charge by slice or by cake (both should be the same) its just how you want to calculate it. But the actual ingredients don't constitute your price, they should be a factor, but so should electricity, cleaning/shopping/prep time, etc. This is the first thing you should have down before taking orders.

Some detail has to be done in fondant or gp, these are also things you'll need to be able to explain to your customer. Some designs are simply easier or look better in fondant, if they bring you a picture of a fondant covered cake and want you to recreate it in BC you need to be able to explain why (if) it will work better in fondant, but you need to know those reasons before you can expect a customer to tryst in your expertise. It's your business if you don't want to do BC then refer them to another bakery.

AAlso be careful about recreating designs like that. Those are copyrights and if a company took the mind to, they could sue you. & they would in. Look into using a topper of some kind. Especially since you're in business, if this was a private matter there probably would be little chance of getting caught.

AThank you everyone, I'll be going through every expense again and go from there :) & I'll look at some toppers online to play it safe Thanks again

AOk so I pulled out my receipts, figured out my ingredient costs along with other items, etc. The one thing I wasn't adding was the Labor Cost. I've never done by the servings price,but I'm actually wanting to that instead , my question is, if I do the servings do I add all my costs/labor cost plus the servings? sorry for sounding complicated lol I'm just trying to figure out how Servings work and what price to start at for each serving.

A

Your price per serving should include your cost of ingredients, cost of labor (assuming you want to be paid for your work), allocated overhead, and a markup for profit based on local market values. If you already have a per-serving price that is not based on facts you should throw it out and start from scratch.

AI'm using the Wilton Chart so I divide my Total cost by 12 for a 6"? I'm guessing I do that for every size so I will have different prices or am I doing this all wrong.?

A

If you calculate your costs correctly, you are right that different size cakes will have different per-serving costs (per-serving costs drop as the cake gets larger). If the difference is not that significant you can just go with the most expensive cost across the board as your basis for price, or you could have a flat starting price for each tier size and hold off on calculating the per-serving price until you add up all the tiers in the order. If you are allocating overhead on a per-order basis you would also apply overhead once to the final order instead of building the overhead cost into each tier.