I've started a blog and have been working on what I'm hoping will be a regular feature called Price This Cake With Me where I price out a cake I'm currently working on. But I would like to get more into the specifics of what people are struggling with when in comes to pricing and writing specifically on those points. So my question is, what are some aspects of pricing that you struggle with? 

This is the blog; it's pretty bare right now but I have some posts coming. www.thelittlespoonbakingblog.wordpress.com

Hi. I checked out your blog page and it looks good so far. I just wanted to give you a heads-up about a spelling typo you might want to correct.

"Weather you are just looking for a fool proof buttercream recipe for a family birthday cake, professional tips and tricks for applying fondant or information on how to open your own legal cake business we cover it all."

It should be "whether", not "weather".

I look forward to seeing your tips and advice.

Thank you!

gingerlocks -- this is awesome of you-- very awesome!

be sure to cover serving sizes  thank you for doing this

Of course I'm sure you are aware of the many elements that enter into pricing.  If by chance you are not I'll mention some of them as I'm sure I cannot remember nor know all of them:

location, compitition in y our area, utilities, taxes, liscense fees, rent (even if you own your home a portions can be witten off somehow), cost of ingredients, packaging etc, do you deliver?  How much to charge for mileage/deliveries, are you legal? can you be in your area?  What it cost you to invest in training & equipment.......

That's about all I can think of right now.   

this makes me happy every time i see it --

and i know you will but do the minimum charge thing where clients can't try and dumb down the sculpted cake to three and a half servings or something

thank you

and tell 'em how starting with low prices and raising them later doesn't work too good -- cause you lose all you've built that far 

I'd love to your blog when it's finished as well!  Being new to the business and decorating in itself, pricing is something that I am so conflicted about!  I would love to see why charging less starting out is a bad idea.  I see all the time where more experienced people talk about how they started out undercharging, but as they learned and did it more, they raised their prices.  So I myself don't see why starting a little lower to compensate for just starting out or not being as experienced, and then slowly raising as you go would be bad, since so many people seem to have done it!

I'd also love to know about the whole process of gathering info on other bakeries.  Some bakeries have their prices open to the public, but what about the custom cakes?  Do you just show a bunch of bakeries some pictures, leading them on as if you want that cake and then deny the order, or just tell them you are the competition and are curious?

Either way, I can't wait until your site is finished!

because you will lose the customers you cultivated at the lower price level -- you start over --

Never, ever do this! I've had it done to me, and we find out and you will get the worst reputation..and when it comes time that I need to recommend another baker; you will the be first one I tell customers "not to bother with". That's something I would like to talk about; but my little tidbit of advice is this: don't worry about what another bakery is charging; you don't have their overhead or expenses, you have your own you need to cover and you don't know how much it costs them to make x,y,z cake. You need to put in the work and cost out what YOU do, not what someone else is doing. 

That is the advice I see the most on here! I never really liked the idea of it, either, so always wondered how people did this.