Will You Tell Me Your Cost For A 10 Inch Round?

Business By mystsparkle Updated 9 Apr 2013 , 4:40am by kikiandkyle

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mystsparkle Posted 5 Apr 2013 , 11:46pm
post #1 of 22

I'm playing around with my costs, and I wanted to get an idea of what your cost are.  I know it may not matter - being in different states.. But right now I do not buy bulk..just standard grocery store items, and I tried google searching and found some links where people stated their costs..but were a few years old and also much less than mine.. which made me wonder why mine were so high.

 

I'm asking for a cost on a 10 inch round cake (just your batter/filling/buttercream cost) Nothing special. I'm pricing out a chocolate cake, vanilla buttercream.... 6 cups of batter in each pan (x2 making the cake 4 inches high- so 12 cups of batter) and 5 cups of buttercream for filling and frosting.

 

My cost comes out to just around $20.  Does that seem high?

 

Any input would be great! Thank you

21 replies
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kikiandkyle Posted 5 Apr 2013 , 11:53pm
post #2 of 22

I have only worked out the cost of one 10 inch chocolate cake before, it would probably cost me less than $15 to make that cake, not counting cost of fuel, or cake boards. I buy some of my stuff at Costco but it's not a significant saving.

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Norasmom Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 1:47am
post #3 of 22

shopping in bulk, about $11.00

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scrumdiddlycakes Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 2:29am
post #4 of 22

A 2 layer 10" with vanilla buttercream runs me about $16 of just ingredients. That is buying bulk, using high end chocolate and real vanilla bean.

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Stitches Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 2:33am
post #5 of 22

This doesn't include gas or labor to buy the items, nor any over head costs, it's strictly the item costs as is. I don't have my recipes broken down for 10" cakes. But here's my costs on a 9". I do 3 layers per cake, 1.25" tall each layer.

 

Cake box: 0.34 cents

Gold foil cake circle: 0.22 cents

 

Vanilla Cake with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting:

v. cake: $4.47

v. American style buttercream: $4.30

 

Chocolate cake: $4.33

v. buttercream: $4.30

 

For these 2 cakes options I buy from Restaurant Depot, Sam's Club and Costco. I forget where I order my gold boards from (at this moment) but I buy them online.

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mystsparkle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 2:41am
post #6 of 22

oh boy..my prices are way to high then!  thank you all for helping - any others please chime in if you'd like!

 

I priced buying bulk at Sams Club - and it really wouldn't be as much savings as you all !

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kikiandkyle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 2:52am
post #7 of 22

AFor me the most expensive thing is butter, and I can get 4lbs for $7 at Costco which is about half what I'd pay at the store. Then it's the chocolate and the cocoa powder, again I can save pretty good on those at Sams or Costco over retail. Also, we don't all use the same ingredients - do you have actual chocolate in your cake or just cocoa powder? Do you do meringue buttercream or American?

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mystsparkle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 2:56am
post #8 of 22

My stuff is pretty basic... I use cocoa powder in my chocolate cake - and just standard 2 sticks of butter 1 cup of shortn for my buttercream.  And my cost is so much higher than the other poster who DOES use high end items.

 

My chocolate is more expensive to make than my vanilla (Vanilla is just basic WASC) so i priced it out using y chocolate... but then if i get into my other flavors of cakes..or filling choices..it just goes up from there once you add in all the extras!

 

I'm trying my hardest to make sure i am covering all my costs..but when i sit here and see how much it just cost me to MAKE the cake...and that's not adding in my boards, my boxes, - its kind of shocking to see how much it is! 

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Stitches Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:04am
post #9 of 22

I should have added I bake completely from scratch. I use cocoa powder in my choc. cake and Nielsen Massey real vanilla.

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mystsparkle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:05am
post #10 of 22

Just checked Sams Club website... For butter it looks like I'd save a bit.... It's a $1.28 cheaper to buy 4 sticks (1 lb) from them vs Walmart.  But that's not a HUGE difference.

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mystsparkle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:07am
post #11 of 22

Stitches - you would think scratch would be more expensive than doctored box mix no?  My vanilla is doctored box while my chocolate is scratch... But my chocolate is much more expensive to make than yours - AND you do 3 layers of cake, while mine is only 2. oi just confuses me more.

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Annabakescakes Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:09am
post #12 of 22

AI haven't done mine in a while, but when I was using box mixes, cake and icing for. 10" cost about $18.

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Stitches Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:11am
post #13 of 22

Scratch is definitely cheaper. If your chocolate cake is more expensive then your vanilla you're probably using all butter in your cake, no? Find a recipe that uses oil instead.

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mystsparkle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:13am
post #14 of 22

No its actually oil..its Martha Stewart One bowl chocolate cake or something.. And i actually figured out the prices by using the wilton chart on how many cups of batter / cups of buttercream would be used. (i have some written down on what i ACTUALLY used...but some sizes i haven't baked so i used that chart) 

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mystsparkle Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:14am
post #15 of 22

And i guess i never thought about scratch being cheaper!! I may have to just test out some more cake recipes and find cheaper ones... that Martha stewart one uses 3 cups sugar, 3 cups of flour..which im sure is more than normal...and i want to say it only gives me about 6 cups of batter in the end...so im sure that all matters too..with wasc i think i get much more batter.

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liz at sugar Posted 6 Apr 2013 , 3:18am
post #16 of 22

I can tell you from owning a restaurant, the items with the best savings from our restaurant supplier over the grocery store are cream and butter.  Heavy whipping cream is a good $1.50 less per 32 oz. carton from our supplier.  Butter is routinely 50 cents to $1.00 cheaper than grocery store prices, per pound.

 

Surprisingly, cake mixes are routinely less at the grocery store (on sale).  I asked our rep about this, and he said grocery store mixes have gotten so much better with pudding add ins and such, that they have surpassed what suppliers offer.  His cake mixes start at $2 per pound, and you can often get store mixes in our area for $1 to 1.25 per pound on sale.

 

Liz
 

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kikiandkyle Posted 7 Apr 2013 , 1:36pm
post #17 of 22

AHow many recipes of that Martha Stewart cake do you make for a 10 inch round? It's got a lot of ingredients to only make 3 eight inch layers, 1.5 cups cocoa, 3 cups flour, 3 cups sugar, 3 eggs, 1.5 cups buttermilk, 3/4 cup oil - it would cost me at the most $5 for the ingredients for one quantity. You are counting only the amount you use, rather than the cost of the whole pack right?

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Stitches Posted 8 Apr 2013 , 12:49am
post #18 of 22

Kikiandkyle you first have to break down all you ingredients into a spread sheet.

 

Here's an small example of mine:

 

 

Item Unit Package Weight $ Package  $ Per Unit/lb $ Per Oz. Oz. Per Cup $ Per Cup Company Almond Paste Lb 7 $27.19 $3.88 $0.24 10 $2.43 R. Depot Apple Cider gallon 1 $3.98 $0.00 $0.03 8 $0.25 Sams Club Apple, Granny Smith Fresh lb 5 $5.98 $1.20       Sams Club Apple, Granny Smith Fresh lb 6 $6.49 $1.08       Costco Apple, Granny Smith Fresh lb 3 $3.87 $1.29       Walmart Apple Granny Smith Fresh lb 6 $4.29 $0.72 .09 each     R. Depot Apples IQF case 30 $31.31 $1.04   8 $0.52 CLCC Apple, Filling bkt 1/20 lb $34.32 1.72 lb   8 $0.86 Dawn Baking Powder lb 5 $8.46 $1.69 $0.11     R. Depot Baking Powder lb   $5.78         Sams Club Baking Soda lb 5 $4.74 $0.95 $0.06 8??   R. Depot Baking Soda lb 1 $0.79 $0.79 $0.05 8?? 0.40 CLCC Bananas, Fresh lb 3 $1.48 $0.49 $0.00 8?? .17 per B Sams Club Bananas, Case lb 40 $16.95 $0.42 $0.03 8?? $0.21 R. Depot Bananas, Fresh lb 1 $0.42 $0.42 $0.03 8?? $0.21 Walmart Bluberries, IQF lb 10 $27.96 $2.80 $0.17 4 $0.70 R. Depot Blueberries, IQF lb 3 $9.28 $3.09       Sams Club Blueberries, IQF lb 4 $9.99 $2.50 $0.16 4 0.63 Costco

 

Then you write down you recipes in weights and price out each ingredient. That gives you the total cost of making that batch. Then you figure out what the yield is for each batch. From there you can combine different components/recipes to know what your costs are per item.

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kikiandkyle Posted 8 Apr 2013 , 1:28am
post #19 of 22

AThat's what I do, I was asking the OP if they were! But useful info nonetheless!

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mystsparkle Posted 9 Apr 2013 , 1:36am
post #20 of 22

I use 2 recipes to make 1 - 10 inch round (you know... a 2 inch pan baked twice). And yes, I did make sure to price everything out per cup ect..just for what I need for that specific recipe.

There are a lot more ingredients in her recipe than in other chocolate recipes I tried..and sometimes I think maybe doesn't even make more batter.

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mystsparkle Posted 9 Apr 2013 , 1:38am
post #21 of 22

Well ...if that would cost you around $5..then for a complete 10 inch cake - $10, plus the cost of buttercream..but I doubt that should be another $10. I think I need to re check my break down..maybe I messed something up in calculation somewhere. I did go to Sams and price check some items and i'm going to compare to my grocery stores.

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kikiandkyle Posted 9 Apr 2013 , 4:40am
post #22 of 22

AMy buttercream is $3.50 - $1 for 6 eggs, $2 for 1lb butter, 50c for 1.5 cups sugar. I'd make two quantities to fill and cover a 10inch.

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