do you cost out your recipes? if so do you do it for all of your recipes? and do you do it for each size of your recipe? like same recipe for 10" cake , and the for 6" cake? 

my husband and I stayed up late last night making an excel spreadsheet to cost out a chocolate cake recipe. it was for one 10" chocolate cake without frosting.

 Last night I had a bunch of really specific questions, but now I can't remember any. so do you have any tips or suggestions when costing out a recipe?

oh now I remember some. do you find that you get reliable prices looking online? or do you go to the store and look at a bag of flour? is there a huge difference if you are buying in bulk? we costed out the recipe with the prices of a single 5# bag of flour or sugar? is that a bad way to do it?

also for recipes that are measured in cups, how do you figure out the price per unit?

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipe/master-weight-chart.html

we used this chart, but my husband said he didn't believe it or understand it. is there a better way out there?

ACost out each recipe for each size based on how you will normally purchase your ingredients. If you will be buying retail from a grocery store, be sure to use the non-sale price. Bulk purchases are often significantly cheaper per unit, but you have to be able to store them and use them up before they expire.

Weight per volume will vary depending on your process. The most reliable way to come up with an accurate weight is to actually weigh each ingredient as you are making the recipe. For more accuracy you make the recipe multiple times, record the weight for each ingredient each time, and average the results.

Don't forget to include labor, allocated overhead, and markup for profit when setting your prices.

Kayla,

This is what I have been using, and it's working great.  The only thing I don't have calculating automatically is the conversions - still working on that, but it'll be a one time thing for you to figure out.  Pop in your supplies, ingredients, recipes and servings, and it'll be good to go.  Also, remember to put in whatever mark up you want on the quote sheet in the top row of columns S and V - that's for supplies and ingredients.

Let me know if you have any questions about it.  GL!

Karen

Attachment...oops 

AI would cost out my recipes individually first. That way when I have a project I can justbplug in what i already know.

I just added the conversions.  If you look at the recipe tab and the ingredients tab, it should be all there, although I've probably missed something

Stitches, just click on the paperclip to attach a document..

AHave you tried the Cakeulator app? Works great, you can input a master recipe and then get prices per whole cake, per serving, etc. also will add in profit and prep/decorating time.

Liz

ACakeulator? Available on droid?

Yep - here's information about it.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pts.cakeulator&hl=en

I am having a hard time pricing cakes. I usually use a per slice cost but when the cost keeps going up and up I have a hard time and want to start cutting the per slice amount. Is there a per slice amount based on total? Like 1-100 $3/slice 100-200 $2.50/slice, basically a discount the more you add?

A

If you price based on your costs, you are correct that the per serving price will drop as the cake gets larger, if all else is equal (e.g. no added complexity for the larger design). I recommend handling pricing based on a formula that can be applied to any number of servings instead of tiered pricing, since with tiers you get into a situation where (in your example) 100 servings and 120 servings would be the same price.

The reasons per-serving prices drop as the cake gets larger are because you have a fixed amount of overhead applied to each order and the additional labor involved in making a larger cake of equivalent complexity probably won't scale 1:1 to the increased cost with a fixed per-serving price.

I hope I'm not late in replying to this thread. But here's a post that might help.

http://veenaartofcakes.blogspot.co.il/2012/01/pricing-your-cakes-beginners-guide.html

Thanks

That's because of the weird "profit" setup on the options page.  You are entering your markup, not your profit margin.  I have mine set at 200, which is basically 3x costs.

Liz
 

thank you everyone so much. all of this info is very helpful

Amakes sense, thanks!

 I was determined to make this work. For some reason earlier today I couldn't get it to work.

Urg...........don't bother it still won't work and now I can't delete it either. Sorry.

ok I have one more question. when you are costing out a recipe, with just egg whites ( like butter cream), how do you do that? do you just call it eggs?  

I bought cakeboss back in march. it has a great recipe costing section and allows you to calculate your exact costs including overhead into every cake to ensure you have priced the cake accurately.  It definitely has its limitations but it works well for me for what I need.  It keeps track of my orders and appointments and overdue/pending payments.  It has made me so much more efficient in my booking and case management end of my business.  It takes some time to get all your costs etc into it but worth the time and effort when all you have to do is click and you know exactly what a cake cost you to make and what you made on the cake.  hth

I've seen 3 android cake costing apps out there if you're wanting an app to do it for you.  Good luck.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=uk.co.thecakemakery.costacakepro

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.stirzakerapps.cakedecoratingcalculator

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pts.cakeulator

I would just cost it out as a whole egg.

If you need a lot of egg whites like in a white cake, I get a pint or quart of egg whites with nothing else in them (check the ingredient list) things like eggbeaters do not work in cakes.This is cheaper for me because while I use a lot of whites and whole eggs, I don't use a lot of yolks. It also is cheaper because there is less labor time since you just open the bottle instead of cracking a bunch of eggs. You can also freeze leftover egg whites without any problems. hth

AGrrr this is also what i need to know and hear. Im terrible at the pricing part of this business. Everyone tells me i need to charge more because basically i'm just getting enough for supplies and product, I'm not getting labor because i don't know what is too much or not enough. I'm new to the business aspect of all this. Help please in any way possible lol. Thank you.

ABrenda, you should really check out the spread sheet posted on the front page. It really was a big help to me. That way you know exactly what you're spending on each cake. Good luck!

Speaking about apps, has anyone found one where they can store a list of their supplies, tips, etc?