I’ve been a hobby baker for a good few years now, and contemplated setting up as a business more times than I can count. Yet, one thing keeps preventing me and it’s the fear of not making a profit (because let’s be honest, as much as we all love creating amazing bakes, it’s no fun if we can’t actually earn an income from it).
I don’t know when it started happening, perhaps during the boom of home bakery start ups in Covid, but home bakers are driving down the prices in the baking world and bakers aren’t getting the income they deserve.
In terms of why this is happening, it’s likely down to hobby bakers like me dipping their toes in the pool, but getting nervous about pricing and not wanting to charge what they’re worth because they’re self taught hobby bakers without any formal training. If a family member has asked me to create a birthday cake, I’ve only really ever asked for the costs (for one I’m not a business) but I’ve still found it difficult to ask them to cough up £100 for a 6 inch, 3 layer cake with a bit of fondant on top. Instead I ask for less, which essentially means I’m paying them for me to make a cake! But how could I not, I absolutely love doing it and don’t want to be held back on my creative flare! Or perhaps they need some help working out their costs versus profits, because who wants to spend time working out how much a gram of sugar costs or what they should charge for 1/50th of a bag of sprinkles?! (I have created an automated costing spreadsheet to save you the hassle), and my DMs are always open for questions regardless of how silly you think they are.
Regardless of the why, it’s had a huge impact on the industry with many customers expecting champagne tasting cakes on lemonade prices! Maybe you’ve tried your luck at selling cakes and heard ‘well someone I know only paid £X for a similar cake’ and either they’re lying to haggle a better deal or their baker undersold themselves (and if we’re all guilty of the latter, then you can see how home bakers are driving down prices!).
If you’ve been baking a while, you may have charged, say £1 per cupcake, but with the cost of living crisis, we’ve all suffered the increased cost of butter and yet most home bakers are still reluctant to put their prices up (probably down to fear of offending their customers). However, with costs rising, it’s only natural for the prices of your bakes to rise too and don’t be afraid to do that.
When it comes to custom bakes, I see a lot of parallels with the beauty industry. Think nails (but to be honest lashes, brows, the lot) and what it would cost for a 45 min appointment for full custom nail art on each finger. The last time I had this done was in 2020 and it cost me £45. I think these days it costs around £30/£40 for very simple designs, if not just block colours and yet some gals get their nails done every two weeks without batting their freshly applied and overly expensive lashes.
The difference between those working in hair and beauty and home bakers is that they know they have the skills and aren’t afraid to add a mark up for it, so why is it so different for bakers? Particularly, fondant artists who spend so much time (we’re talking days, not hours) on each topper? As well as charging our worth, I also think it’s time we start separating ourselves from the bakers offering basic buttercream bakes with cardboard toppers (still, gorgeous, but a lot less technical skill involved).
One big problem for bakers new to the fondant game is that you can’t just decide you want to start making novelty cakes and charging a mark up on them. It takes a lot of practice to get used to working with fondant and trouble shooting common errors like cracks and bulges. I’m not saying it’s justifiable to hike prices up before you’ve finessed your product. In reality, at this point you should remain a hobby baker until you’ve got to grips with fondant and therefore shouldn’t really be charging for bakes. Trouble is, ingredients are so expensive it’s hard to get good at fondant without spending a fortune on ingredients, so there is a fine balance between getting requests from paying customers but really, still perfecting your craft.
Custom cakes are special, they are a luxury and you deserve every penny for every hour you spent sweating over that tiny detail they probably won’t even notice. You may price a lot of your clients (family, friends and friends of friends) out of their budgets, but you’ll find new circles of customers with a budget that matches your bakes. I’m sure those who aren’t willing to pay what you deserve can find a lovely cake down at their local Tesco and that is fine! But please stop underselling your skills!
Rachael's Buns 
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