The Cakes are selling!!

August 27, 2008 Jasmine
Tags: cakes

(We didn’t sell this cake, it was done up for photos only. Similiar cupcake topper to the Dora ones we will be doing)

This post could be about 10 pages long. lol That chocolate strawberry cake , I decided to price at $45.00. Ingredients, cake boards, and boxes alone cost me $16! It also takes me 50 minutes to whip it up from scratch, then it is an hour in the oven, then Joe was working on frosting/decorating it for it seemed like an hour! I think it was. haha

Maybe it was 30 minutes but between all the coming and going, etc. He will just need to get faster. 😉

So I am clocking it at about 2.5 hours of my time. $16 in cost + $25 in labor = $40.00. I tossed in another $5 because, what if I accidentally burn the cake? The cake alone, no frosting, filling, fruit nothing, just by itself is $4.40. So basically cake price x 2 plus all other ingredients and supplies + $25 = $45.00

And guess what? We are actually selling one in two weeks! There is one family, a lady and her sis and her mom and about 5 kids or so and they love our stuff. I know cause I talked to her on the phone a few times and she even wanted a $20.00 cookie order 2 weeks ago and a $10 brownie order last week, and another brownie order 2 weeks before that.

She actually asked me if we do cakes and I told her yes and was working on getting prices done and pictures to show.

Well it is all done. I went to discuss it with her and they are all so nice. Before I left I was really wincing over the $45.00 cake. I knew that was the one they would be interested in cause she mentioned they love strawberries, cream, chocolate etc. They were the main reason I took the time to look up some really awesome recipes and then went and made it. I did drop a sample off at their house a few days before. She barely got a bite!

I kept going over the pricing in my head but the bottom line was that I do not want to be in my kitchen for 2.5 – 3 hours doing a cake for less than $25.00. We are also using extra electricity, water, gas etc. I also will deliver the cake. It is only about 8 blox away but hey that adds up, time adds up. I also go to the store and buy all these ingredients. I spend alot of time researching recipes and learning about all this etc. My time doesn’t just start in the kitchen. SO I was firm on that price but had other alternatives.

These are our white chocolate chip with macadamian nut cookies.

I offered her the texas sheet cake for $25, I offered to double the cake part and add strawberries and cream all for $35.00. (In case she needs to watch her money but still wants a chocolate cake with whipped cream and strawberries.)

That cake only takes me 20 minutes to whip up and 20 in the oven and you pour the frosting on when it is hot. This can be done in under an hour. It is not hard to double the recipe.

But no, she wanted the $45.00 cake! Covered in heavy whipping cream and layered with strawberries. Good choice. She wants it for the 13th or 16th of next month. No deposit yet, but she has come through on all her other orders. Yeah!!

There is another inquiry for the choc/strawberry $45.00 cake for the 1st. I will find out for sure this weekend.

We also sold a baby texas sheet cake. (half the biggie) for $13.00. I found the perfect sized containers at Walmart and they have a lid!

Today, another regular customer decided they did want to go with us for her grand daughters birthday cake after all. I am really excited about this. I think they had sticker shock at first. hahahaha

But seriously, I can’t compete with the low quality ingredients the store pumps out. They bake 20 cakes at once with junky ingredients and then ship them out frozen where they are slathered in transfat. YUCK!

Brownies with walnuts

They showed interest the other day to Chris but when I went to talk with them, they said someone else already ordered a cake elsewhere. Okay n/p, thanx.

Today her foster son stopped by to ask how big the Dora cake would be. I spent about 20 minutes showing him almost every pan in my house and probably bored him to tears. HAHA

I said I would print up a price list and he could come back and show his foster mom.

He never came back. LOL SO when Chris got home I sent him with this:

Cakes

Rounds:

Single 8″ layer = $14
Double 8″ layer = $25
Triple 8″ layer = $35

or Double layer + 12 cupcakes with plain wrapper and no topper = $35.00

(double layered cakes will be frosted and filled with regular buttercream frosting, heavy whipped cream as icing and filling is extra, fruit is extra)

Rectangle:

1/4 sheet cake = $35.00

1/2 sheet cake = $60.00

Typical 1/4 sheet cakes are made using two, 8 ” rounds. Mine are made using three, 8″ rounds. I slice this cake in half and fill it with buttercream icing. If you would like to have “cool whip frosting” instead, we make it using heavy whipping cream and line it with fresh strawberries or bananas. Additional charge is $10.00

If you would like a themed wrapper and topper for your cupcake, they are available:

Disney Princess, Dora The Explorer, Spiderman. The topper is a toy ring. Add an additional .50 cents per cupcake for each themed cupcake.

So for instance if you order a double layered cake with a dozen cupcakes that would be $35.00. If you would like 6 cupcakes to be “themed” and 6 to be in plain wrappers w/ no toppers that would be an additional $3.(No min. on these)

The following are toothpick toppers and themed wrappers:

tiara, batman, baby’s first birthday, all star birthday. For these you would need to add .25 cents per cupcake. (min.1 dozen on these)

*Toppers for cakes are extra

I think I did pretty good. Chris came back and said she was sounding like she wanted to buy. SO Joe gets home and I had printed out the cake topper I would need to get for her, so I could show her, called the store, it is $7.00 plus tax and they have it in stock. Even brought the bag of cupcake Dora liners(she mentioned maybe wanting cupcakes too).

Knock on the door and her foster daughter said, “Oh we already ordered a cake.”

😦 😦 😦

Okay, thank you.

😦 😦

Yes I was very sad. Not the first time they said no, cause I figured, no biggie, they are watching their money. I know they love our stuff cause they buy other goodies all the time. But them inquiring AGAIN got my hopes up. lol

That was around 4:00 and this evening I was slumping in my chair and whining to Joe. lol And I got the call!!

She was like, “Girl, I know you are always over there cooking up a storm and we love everything. It doesn’t matter what we buy it all taste so good!! Cookies, cupcakes. It reminds me of when I was a little girl. I don’t care what it cost I have to get a cake from you. I want toys on it too and on the cupcakes.”

She really said that! I was so excited!! She then said she needed a single layer 8 inch and 3 dozen cupcakes. She wanted fruit , bananas and strawberries on top of the cake and I told her the dora wrappers and rings are .50 cents more each so if she wants some plain and some like that it would be fine. She said 12 like that. She wanted the toy toppers too.

So I told her I would call her back with a price. I was so nervous!! I know my numbers but every time I kept adding this up I was like, good grief! This is going to be alot of money! (gee, you’d think I was paying for it!!) haha

I finally told myself to STOP crunching the numbers and look at my cost. I also talked with Joe and there is no way we are putting a bunch of fruit on top with a dora packet. It would be cluttered. And I get to spend $2-$4 on strawberries no matter if we can fit one on there or 16! So we decided early on she is getting a double 8 inch layered cake no matter what. lol SO we can fit all her fruit in between the layers.

I added up all the cost including toy toppers for the cake ($7.50), 36 wrappers(pack of 50 for $2.14), dora toy rings to top 12 of them (3.21 for 15). That plus cake, plus fruit, plus frosting plus boxes, etc is approximately $35.00 in food and supplies!!!!

I told myself I am going to have to add $30.00 on to that. SO $65.00 it is. I called her back and told her it would be $65.00 and for that price she would get a double layered cake, cause all the fruit is not going to fit on top and I have to charge her for strawberries whether she gets one or 16. SO she may as well get them all. lol She understood and was okay with that.

I was so proud of myself for not itemizing every single cost. I figure I can give her a receipt so she can see how everything breaks down in case she wants to order again. Of course the receipt would probably show like $80.00. LOL Then what do I do? Say this is with a 18% frequent buyer discount? hahahah

Can’t do that, 18% is too much. Then I would have to mark everything up alot more in order to get the prices I really want. Too confusing and annoying!

$25 ~ double cake
$30 ~ 3 dozen cupcakes added onto a cake order
$7.50 ~ dora topper
$6.00 ~ told her .50 cents extra x 12 for toy rings on the cupcakes
$4.50 ~ fresh fruit

That all = $73, 10% = $7.30 73-7.30 = 65.70, that might be right about on the money.

Arrrghhhh. I’ll figure something out. Bottom line is I am getting paid $30.00 to make her the most awesome cake and cupcakes. Yeah!! We got a $20.00 deposit tonight and she said she will probably pay us the rest tomorrow.

I need to go get more supplies tomorrow. 🙂

I am super excited and getting ready for a huge weekend because the 1st is coming up PLUS labor day and I just know everyone will be wanting us to bake them everything!!

🙂

Entry Filed under: Uncategorized

2 Comments Add your own

• 1. Nic  |  August 31, 2008 at 8:05 am

  Don’t be nervous. You’ve set quality standards and abide by them: your cakes must be way better than the cheap transfatty ones. Hence more expensive, but for a higher quality you’re entitled to ask more money.
  I’m glad for you; you deserve a lot of orders!

  Reply

• 2. jasmine  |  August 31, 2008 at 8:54 am

  Thanx Nic!!! I am going to post my blog about her Dora cake soon! Watch for it!!

  Here it is: Dora cake

  Reply

Trackback this post  |  Subscribe to comments via RSS Feed