AI think we have the responsibility of managing expectations with our customers...even if they say "I don't care". We have to absolutely communicate, draw, explain what they are getting in the end. I do this in my day job...people can't complain after that.

A

I love this, you are spot on Mimi!

Why should a silly old baker get a cut in that type of glory? I mean, it's just cake, isn't it??

AI absolutely agree. The problem is she regarded me more as a friend who does cakes than a business. It has always been business no mater how "friendly" we have been. We have never even met outside of business discussions.

I think the problem was that you have been making elaborate cakes for her for $50 and she had no reason to think that she wasn't going to get one this time around.  It doesn't matter that you told her you've been giving her a discount.  It sounds like you didn't tell her specifically what she would NOW be getting for her $50.  Before you did any work at all you should have been very specific that if her budget was only $50 she'd be getting the flat cake.  If she wanted a cake similar to what you've made her in the past (3D truck) then it would be $X and give her the option. 

Imagine if you had been going to the same hairdresser for a couple of years and every time you went you got a shampoo, highlights and a cut for $25.  Now imagine the next time you go all she does is cut your bangs and tells you that's what $25 gets you in the salon.  I bet you'd be surprised and upset and understandably so, since you are used to your great deal but suddenly you aren't getting it any more.

I agree with the previous poster who suggested you contact any other clients you might have had the same arrangement with.  Thank them for their business and let them know that now that you are more experienced and working in an upscale bakery you will no longer be able to offer them the deep discount you've given in the past but will give them a 10% returning customer discount (or something along those lines).  Otherwise you're going to have a lot more upset customers.

AThe husband ended up loving the cake. Go figure

AWhen I did my first Leland Awards cake, the edible printing worked out beautifully, but the hand-piped lettering was, to my eyes, a disaster that I simply had no time to correct. The folks at the Printing Museum, however, loved it.

When I did my 51st birthday cake, with the "Emergency!" theme, I knew I didn't have anywhere near the time or the skills to recognizably sculpt (or even hand-pipe) an L.A. County Rescue Squad, or a Ward LaFrance P80 fire engine, or the real life fire station (L.A. County 127) that appeared as Station 51, so I went with edible printing, and circumstances put me at a hole-in-the-wall bakery in a bad neighborhood, with an ill-maintained printer that left red streaks on the edible print (after I'd laboriously removed an inconvenient telephone wire from the picture of the station!). Everybody was impressed, both in person and at Cake Central, and I think I was the only one who knew how short the cake fell from my vision of what it was to be.

When I did my Apollo Day cake, a month and a half ago, I was fighting a rip in the edible print. It stuck out like a sore thumb to me, even in the low-res picture I posted to Cake Central, and yet everybody else was amazed at what I'd done.

If a person has a vision of a cake, he or she is going to see all the ways in which the reality falls short of the cake in his or her head, while everybody else is going to see a reality that's probably better than anything they'd expected. Your cake was worth far more than you charged, "lunawhisper0013," and it's not your fault that the wife's vision was totally out of whack with what was achievable on her budget.

AI posted this as a moan on another thread, then remembered there's a thread just for that. :-)

I did a wedding fair last weekend, and I had one lady come up who was lovely, then her mum turned up. Not so lovely. Tried my cakes and said they were absolutely delicious (ok, that bit was nice!) kept on saying that to both daughters, then after asking me how much various designs were turned to bride and and said 'she could make the cakes and leave them plain, I'm sure we can decorate them'. First off, 'She'?! I'm right here lady! Secondly, how irritating is it when someone looks at work that's taken you 20 hours to complete, and basically says it's not worth paying this person for that, let's just diy it. Do it out of earshot at least!

I'm not overly expensive btw, I'm not cheap either, but I know I'm not ott.

She then asked me how much for a plain cake. I said - very pleasantly as it goes - 'I don't know, no one's ever asked before', then just turned away to another customer. I know it's rude, but I was pi**ed and really didn't want to entertain her questions any more.

Also, there's no way I'm putting my name to something when I don't have control over the end result, that would be mad!

1) I donated a cake for a Relay for Life event recently and I stuck around to help cut/serve.  I lovely woman was raving to another volunteer about the cake - and that volunteer directed her to me.  She asked for another piece and raved some more to me.  (Awwww gosh. ) She then comes back and asks if I have a card, which I do - and as I'm handing it to her I mention that I am not local (it was an event 1.5 hrs from my home).  She tells me thats OK - she just wants to me to email her the recipes I used for the cake.

Ummmm.  Awkward.

2) I was recently contacted by a MOB about a wedding cake.  She states that her daughter thinks she is getting a "deal" from a "friend".  She tells me this "friend" offered to make a "small box mix cake with canned buttercream for $60 and 50 cake pops at $2.50 each".  She had seen/tasted my cake at another wedding (totally scratch, totally custom: and thought I would be able to beat the friend's price and she wanted to stay under $100!

I politely told her that she was getting a great deal.  ;)

A[IMG ALT=""]http://www.cakecentral.com/content/type/61/id/3283876/width/350/height/700[/IMG]

A

There's really nothing you can say to that is there? I've come to the conclusion people are just mental, it's the only explanation.

[quote name="lunawhisper0013" url="/t/751860/things-not-to-ask-say-to-a-baker/2880#post_7548104"][IMG ALT=""]http://www.cakecentral.com/content/type/61/id/3283876/width/350/height/700[/IMG][/quote]

:-) I feel like attaching that to the end of every polite 'thank you for your interest' email I send after someone had told me that I should be ashamed of myself, charging actual money for cakes. After all, we all know the ingredients cost nothing and they take 20 minutes to make... :/

AOops, it's not as bad as it looks gingerlocks, my phone changed 'has' to 'had' which does make it look like a specific person said it. I was just generalising though about the rude comments people feel it's ok to throw around. I have had someone actually tell me my quote was 'ridiculous lol', then followed it up with two messages in quick succession essentially slagging me off for trying to rip her off. But who hasn't? :-)

I know my prices are right for my work, so it's not my issue that some people can't afford them (still bums me out though if they're rude). Most customers are just too used to supermarket prices to understand that bespoke costs significantly more!

A"What if I buy the fondant and you just decorate the cake?"

And charge you $10 for all my hard work... go to Walmart and get a cake there instead.

This email from last week:

"I'm looking for cupcakes or a whole cake that are vegan, gluten free and low sugar.
Can you help or do you know someone who can?

Its for a baby shower"

Vegan. Gluten free. Low sugar. 

My response, rather than my usual kind letdown was.: 

"Hi xxxx, 

Hahaa! Love it :-)

A

Hmm. Or as Sherlock Holmes said

"My professional charges are upon a fixed scale," said Holmes coldly. "I do not vary them, save when I remit them altogether."

ABut you'll have to cut the letters out of paper, because that's vegan, low sugar and gluten-free. Make sure you use brown paper to make it fun-free too.