What should your custom cake cost?
Enter how long the cake takes and what that work is paid. The price updates as you type.
The math, step by step
- Labor. For each kind of work, hours times pay. 3 hours of baking at $17 is $51.
- Cost. Add up the labor, then add ingredients and supplies.
- Price. Divide the cost by one minus your margin. With a 45% margin you divide by 0.55, so a $300 cost becomes a $545 price, and $245 of it is profit.
- Delivery. Add the delivery fee on top, since it is not part of the cake.
Why divide instead of adding 45%? Adding 45% to a $300 cost gives $435, and $135 of profit is only 31% of that price. Dividing by 0.55 makes 45% of the price actually profit.
Where most bakers go wrong (we did too)
The hours. Detailed decorating is easy to underestimate because it happens in small pieces across days. Time a few real cakes task by task and the numbers usually go up. That is the work Cakulate does for you: it breaks each design into tasks, times them from your shop’s own history, and prices them at the right person’s pay.
How do I figure out how much to charge for a cake?
Add up the hours the cake takes for each kind of work and multiply by what that work is paid. Add ingredients and supplies. That is your cost. Divide your cost by one minus your margin (for a 45% margin, divide by 0.55) to get the price, then add any delivery fee.
Why not just charge per serving?
Per-serving pricing ignores how long the design takes. Two 50-serving cakes can take 3 hours or 12 hours. Pricing from hours makes sure the detailed work gets paid.
What profit margin should a cake business use?
Many solo cake artists and custom shops aim for 40 to 50% on custom work, because it covers rent, equipment, insurance, slow weeks and the owner’s time that is not on any single cake. Use what your numbers support.
What if I do everything myself?
Use what you would pay someone else to do each kind of work. If you charge yourself nothing, the business only survives on your unpaid hours.