I saw this pricing sheet for cakes/cookies/truffles on my Facebook feed. The girl had tons of comments asking for availability. 

I realized this is why starting/sustaining a professional cake business where you actually make money is so difficult. People like her are crazy to do all this work for so little money.

http://www.cakecentral.com/gallery/i/3347391/cheap-cake-price-sheet

That just made my stomach turn...

I am not a professional cake maker however, feel for all professionals who have to come up against something like this.  I bet though, that these prices are not the ones this person ends up charging.  You will note it says "starting" price.  I think the final product will end up costing much more.  I can understand though, that when people see these prices and do not enquire any further they will expect the same cost from other cake makers.  It really is awful.

Holy Cow!  Why bother "selling"?  She's working at a loss as soon as she turns on the oven even if she buys all her ingredients at the dollar store!  She must use all add water only mixes.

Cupcakes $ 8.00 dozen. Are you sure it's current price list? 

Oh my goodness that is ridiculously cheap! It really makes me question the quality. You can't even get the ingredients for that! 

I see that every day and it's ridiculous. Not just in my area, either. In the last two weeks I've had three or four people tell me that their budgets for a cake are really low and it's because of this kind of thing.

I live in a medium sized town and yes - the pricing sheet is current! I was really shocked. 

I found this article that I wrote in January, It contains a pricing chart from the Houston area: http://acaketorememberva.blogspot.com/2014/12/harsh-reality-for-cake-businesses-for.html

I have a cheap cake lady in my town with a store front and it's beyond frustrating.  She is supposedly so busy that she's turning away about 30 cake orders a week.  It's not worth it for me to complete with her.  Besides that, her cakes are not very nice looking.  I just don't get it.

She's selling gourmet flavored cupcakes with adorable wrappers and girl scout cookies and candy bars on top for $2.25 a piece. I just don't understand how she's making any money at all.

volume volume volume. But I do know of a bunch of people who had to close their businesses because they were soooo busy but weren't making any money.

That's what I'm wondering, how long she'll be able to stay open.  I'm thinking, if you're turning away that much business, you need to raise your prices. 

All my orders come from other towns and I'm just focusing on those towns, not even bothering with my own right now.

I know it's not likely with cakes typically being a custom product, but I wish well-known profitable bakers would more openly advertise the cost of their cakes/cupcakes with the pictures. I think a lot of consumers and cheap cake decorators really just don't know what a cake is worth.   You can pretty easily find the price of a wedding dress, but trying to find the price of a custom wedding or birthday cake is almost impossible without directly asking. Can you imagine if the Ace of Cakes or Cake Boss shows talked about how much the cakes they showcase sell for?  I'm not talking about just the minimum orders, either. Then perhaps the cheap cakers would have an easier time appropriately pricing their products and customers might not have such sticker shock at custom cakes. 

In the mean time, I'll just keep educating people when they assume my cakes are cheaper because I'm a residential business.  Sigh.