looking into opening a small cake buisness and I say that instead of bakery cause Im not making donuts and muffins and things just cakes cupcakes and cookies, so I don't know if there is a different but anyway, I'm wondering for all those that have a small cake business outside the home what are good business hours? I'm sure if varies in small vrs big towns, I live in a smal town, but was just curious what works for you. Thanks for any input.

Living in a small town myself, I can see where having the "store hours" more in the afternoon when kids get out of school and people are on their way home from work would work out okay! (just my idea) but have a cell on you during the day for daytime orders. I personally very rarely get ANY orders during the morning, they are all in the afternoon or phone calls or emails on people's lunch breaks. No one ever picks up a cake or anything until they are on their way home from work, or Saturday mornings before their parties. If it were me, I would try to be open in the "rush hour home" time! (I know I am very technical)

thanks so much for your input, I was originally thinking from 9-5 mon thru friday, 9-noon sat, and a "pick up" time on sunday from like 12-2? But was just curious what other cakery's do!

Saturday and Sunday are the biggest retail days. And 9 to 5 is when everyone is at work and not in your shop. You will be leaving income on the table.

If I had my own set hours, it would be
10-6 or 11-7 because I would just be selling cakes or cupakes and I would be starting work at 7 or 8 and that's long enough..
Jodi

If it were me, I would want to be as flexible as possible for both stay-at-home moms and working moms. This would mean you have to be open early enough for moms out running errands and late enough for when working moms get off. So, if you are open at 10:00 a.m. this catches stay-at-home moms running errands, and 7:00 p.m. is late enough to catch mothers getting off work from the 9-5. It also catches those who work say a factory job and are getting off around 3:00. I wouldn't be dilusional enough to think I would be working an eight hour day. I would imagine that even with good organizational skills it would be closer to about 12, but I don't own my own business so I could be all wet.

good points! any other opinions??? Do most people on here bake from home?

Before you open the business, go get the book, the E-Myth and read it. It will help you look at everything in a different light. It has helped me run my business much more effectively and I had wished I had read this much earlier in my business.

I had a retail shop for Mums and babies. I ran the hours at first closed Sunday/Monday and open Tuesday - Saturday 10-5pm with Thursday evenings being a late day until 8-9pm. Looking back, I should have done a closed Wednesday and worked the other days of the week (Wednesdays were always dead)

10am was a great opening time, I had time to drop my kids off at daycare, get the other one to school and swing by the coffee shop before I began my day. There was always a Mum that came in right at 10am for my particular business. The Mums doing errands. At 5pm although people knew I had to close to pick up my children from daycare, they could only come right then because they to worked until 5pm - it would have been better to be open for an extra hour and half for those customers.

I also had private appointments available after hours. Sounds weird in retail but it was the one thing people gushed about. They loved having a private shopping appointment and I always had great sales with those.

I would say 11-7pm or 10-6:30pm would be perfect for bakery hours. I would be open Saturday/Sunday because those are the days people are going to be picking up and busy days for weekend people. Close on a Monday/Tuesday instead perhaps?

You should first confirm (from your business plan) that your local market will support a bakery that only makes cakes, cupcakes, and cookies...you will have a pretty big fixed overhead charge every month for rent and loans from building out your space and buying equipment. If you can't legally bake commercially at home another option would be to rent a commercial kitchen, where you would deliver orders and schedule pickup appointments for customers without having any set hours. The kitchen rental option is far cheaper to start out and much more flexible than a retail shop.

Small town here also. I have a small cake shop. I sell cupcakes, cookies, cake by the slice, muffins, and of course special order cakes. I am open 8-5 M-F and 9-12 Sat closed on Sun. I also sell coffee and soda. I started out 10-6, the extra hour in the evening didn't produce much for me. I decided to open earlier in the morning to try to get people in to buy muffins and coffee but still not a lot of that. I am here from 6am-5pm most days. Good luck on your venture.

Joanne