STICK TO YOUR GUNS!

Your cake friends are there with you in spirit!

I can't wait to hear the end of this, well the end of their time with you today. That and Challenge. What a day of suspense! Good luck and may they leave withouth the rosie colored sunglasses on!

Oh good luck Angie,but the trick is to make them work,not just sit around,find something for them to do,even if you have to invent it.

angelicconfections,

Where in rural WI are you from?

Thanks.

I would be willing to bet that things are more difficult and take even LONGER with a clueless person in your way. I don't think I could do it, I would just want to scream! It should be a good lesson to her though...

I'm still new enough to the world of caking to be stunned by the way people try to con free cakes out of people. I guess I've been spoiled.

My coworkers know how much time and effort I put into the cakes, cookies and other treats I bring to the office. They know how much money I spend on the boxes of goodies I bring into the annual charity bake sale. And many of them say "why don't you just donate the cash - it would be less work!" *lol*

When DH and I got married, we didn't need or want a big wedding or party - so we invited about 20 people, didn't tell them it was a wedding, and the whole thing - food, marriage commissioner, disposable cameras, his-and-hers reindeer antlers - cost less than $500.

If you're low on cash, you don't invite 250 people to a wedding. I don't even know 250 people I'd WANT at my wedding. Finding 20 people I actually wanted to share my wedding with (family excluded) was enough!

From one Angie to another...Stick to your guns! I have been a doormat more times than I care to mention, in both my businesses, but learned the hardway, now I'm a biotch when it comes to my pricing. I no longer give away my goods, unless it will benefit me. I did do a very expensive cake this weekend for a non-profit organization (San Antonio Metropolitan Ballet), but I received tons of publicity because of it. All it will take is to have a couple of large event cakes generated from this to put me in the black for this cake. They did pay some money but it didn't even cover my costs, but there was a free full page ad in their program book, and I was listed as a sponsor for the big event, which did get quite a bit of press. The cake I did would have cost $4875 to feed 650 ppl.

But for friends, I only offer a discount if they DON'T expect one, if they out and out ask for a freebie or near freebie, I simply say I am booked for that weekend. Hang tough girl it does pay off, and it does weed out those that are only fair weather friends as opposed to those that are your true ones. My true ones insist on paying my full price, and like the other poster above whose friends always pay back in kind, a true friend doesn't ask you to lose money for their benefit.

Hi again, well my friend just left. The bride didn't come, she begged off on grounds of morning sickness. My friend walked in to find my tools, cakes and big bowl of icing ready to roll on the counter. I had to make several hula dancers and hibiscus flowers from gumpaste.

She said all ready, great this shouldn't take long right?

ahem, right

I spent the first couple of hours teaching her how to make flowers and figures. Then I had her put on gloves and instructed her on how to ice the cakes. She made a mess with the large icing tip and a large featherweight bag from wilton. Then while I worked on gumpaste more she spent about 45 min trying to get the icing smooth and gave up cussin and sweating. I took over and showed her my carefull smoothing with a large flat spatula warmed in hot water. She left about an hour ago, I just had supper with my family. the cake we worked on wasn't finished by the time she left swearing it was more work than her job at a furniture factory. Oh really? No kidding, and here I thought this was all child's play. I am meeting the bride on friday, somehow I don't think my friend is going to continue on her, it's no sweat just be generous and give her a freebie line. She swore she would never, ever work for me. Hmm, I geuss caking is a 'real' job after all

tee hee. yayy a happy ending! Good for you

good job! hopefully your friend can figure out that feeding 250 people a slice of cake is very expensive and time consuming now, not to mention requires talent!

i don't do (a lot) of freebies it's my choice and if I offer it's a gift (and i only offer if i know i have time, and it's not expected as a freebie) i just did a pullapart cake and personalized ballet slippers for my daughter's best friend (we're bf's too) and she wrote me a check for both (while complaining that i WASN"T charging ENOUGH) so when i got home my dh and i decided to tear the check up-she does a lot for me and i offered and my dh couldn't accept her money either. meanwhile she had told her dh who is a chef and both said it wasn't enough hehe i wonder what he said when she told him i tore up the check. sorry long but i do like that i get to decide how much (if any) i charge and she certainly doesn't acpect to be treated as anyone other than another paying customer

You know? We are all having money issues...Making cakes is our business or hobby - I know don't charge as I should. I made two cakes that I was asked to make. I wasn't paid for them. It wasn't so much the money but the materials and time it took to make the cakes. Plus the audacity that they can look at you and not have any guilt or whatever...I need to learn to be tougher with these people. Who can tell me somewhat what to charge for certain cakes. People don't know how much time and effort is put into these cakes that they eat, and enjoy...while I'm trying to recuperate...

Good on you for standing your ground and making a point to show someone that what you do takes time, effort and money!! Sometimes people just really don't have a clue!!

I've been wanting to start cake decorating for a few years now and I finally signed up for a course, which i am very excited about!! So i tell my best friend how super excited i am and then it started!! It's about 2 weeks till my course and i already have my friend going on about how great it is that i'll be able to make her kids birthday cakes!! She is even talking about me making one for her son's birthday and i've told her that i'll only be half way through my course!! But she is already coming up with "ideas." And even if i decide to do it i know she is expecting me to give it to her for nothing!!
Now i know i don't have anywhere near the talent to be charging her, but if she wasn't trying to spounge off me i would of offered to make the cake, and give it to her for free, but now that i'm feeling used and after reading these stories of what one free cake can do, i'm going to wait and see if she asks for me to make it and if she does i'll be informing her how much it will cost her for me to make it for her!!
Thanks to the people for posting their stories on this forum...now i'm determined not to back down!!

Nard,

Welcome to CC! You'll soon be addicted like the rest of us!! Don't back down to your "friend" because once you start giving them away, it will never end!! You'll soon discover friends that you didn't even know you had!!

I wonder how you can have NO money and have a wedding for 250 people too. outrageous if you ask me. you are losing money simpley by offering to do a sm.2-tier w/sheet cakes,thats a very generous offer and I hope they realize it.Your friend could have come to you first, and asked if youd be willing to do a cake that inexpensive before making a promise she couldn't keep.I myself totally lost a friend over me doing her wedding cake last summer,and I did indeed discount her because we were friends for about 6yrs.She still thought it wasn't cheap enough and the whole situation got out of controll and the tears started and the he said she said crap etc.now we don't talk what so ever and I wasn't even invited to the wedding,which still hurts me.SOOOOOOO my point is friends/family don't mix well with favors like this and its so so sad. Just stick to your guns and don't get in a sticky situation.

Thanks christeena,

Already loving this site!!!

I must admit i had thought to myself...oh maybe this one time, but thankfully after hearing everyone's stories i'll be doing my best not fall into that trap *cross fingers*

Hi ho again, I did't meet up the bride on fri because my girl came home sick from school but... I talked the friend today. She stated her shock that $100 was about equal to material costs.

what! for just one sheet cake!

nooo, one sheet cake is for just about 94, you said 250.

oh, so two sheets, we only had one for our wedding and we invited 300

yes, but not everyone attended and you didn't notice but there was not enough cake to go around

oh, well I don't know

great, I do. if she wants enough sheet cake for 250 and a small 2 tier it's $150, thanks gotta go.

I got it out of her that she went around to walmart, target, and festival foods and geuss what, their sheet cakes won't feed 250 either. Hmm, really and they cost more than $25 a full sheet too. So, I didn't ask her how humble pie tastes but she laughed and admitted that I wasn't a cake idot or greedy. how shocking

Thanks for sharing that conversation! I enjoyed it so much I read it 4 times just for the pleasure of it!

if they're broke then why have a wedding and invite 250 people? that's just crazy.

People are just annoyingly unbelievable.

I just do cakes for friends, family, friends of friends and I've learned (ok, I'm still learning) to quote full retail price. Nothing irritates me more that when I do a cake at cost, or close to it, and they treat me like I'm robbing them. I have a few friends who get free cake and really, really appreciate it.

I had one bride's mom, who I knew from a decade ago, call me complaining that the local places in town start at $6 slice for buttercream! "Yes, that seems about right." I say, which it is for this neck of the woods. I offered to do a simple buttercream 2 tier job for ALOT less, thinking they would jump at it, or geez.... at least be appreciative, and they still acted as if it was highway robbery! (They were going to costco to feed the rest of the guests...fine...whatever, don't get me started on that one.)

Suddenly, whoops, sorry.....my mistake....I was going out of town that weekend. When it comes to cake, people don't know a deal when it hits them in the face, so now I just quote full retail. The brides quote was, "Cake just really isn't that important to us." Well, then...WTH?? Your cake is not that important to me either!

Oohh, the threat to go to costco, or around here sam's club, just fries my chicken. I have in my contract, if I arrive and find sheet cakes from another vendor me and my cake go bye-bye no refund. My friend did suggest they do were going to do this and I told her go right ahead, but thier sheet cakes were any less exspensive than mine but were not my homemade quality. I'll do this cake for her but I am done with the freebie cakes!

i was contacted by bridezilla yesterday, she somehow got it into her head that because I said I would do sheet cakes for $150 that meant i agreed to do the cake of her dreams for $150, and she wants pics and references. I laughed, met her over at my friend's house this afternoon we were all invited to a cookout. I showed her some of my pics, and then whipped out one of my wilton books and went over the steps of making a detailed wedding cake and gave her my breakdown of material costs. She huffed, and puffed, and burst into tears. I handed her a box of tissues, a cup of lemonade and gave her the number for the local IGA bakery. She can get her sheet cakes from there. My friend, as I said changed her tune after I had her sit in on a decorating session. After the bride went home less than happy my friend, my aunt, my neice and I all sat around the kitchen table and paged through cake books admiring the designs. And my aunt ordered a guitar cake for my cousin's 17th birthday next month. It was a breakthrough, she never actually paid for one of my cakes before. Thank you all for the support to stick to my guns and not cave under pressure from a crying pregnant bride and a long time friend. My girlfriend, I belive will not ever again under appriciate my efforts for her kid's cakes.