Wedding cupcake mishap AIBU bride wants full refund for me wrecking her big day?

[ilovepombears]

I run a home based cake making business a few months ago I had a request from a bride to make 100 black cupcakes for her wedding. She provided the wrappers and black food colouring paste and also black and white photo toppers of the couple as she asked it this would bring the costs down so I deducted this from the bill.

Today is her wedding day and there seems to be a massive miscommunication somewhere along the lines.
Friday I baked all 100 cupcakes and whilst I was waiting for them to cool I text her and asked if she was sure she wanted them all black buttercream or if she would prefer black and white or black and grey. She texted back and said 50 black 50 grey would be ace. I then had another text asking where the buttercream was going. This should of really set off alarm bells. I told her the buttercream would be going on top of each cupcake. No further response.

As the wedding is out of town she came to collect them yesterday. They looked stunning and really complimented her wedding theme. She seemed a bit off when collecting but said she liked them.

Two hours later I receive a text from her saying how dissapointed she is with the cakes and how they are not as disscused as the cakes are white.

I didn't understand where she was coming from so I tried to call but she didn't answer then text to say I have wrecked her wedding.

After a while of toing and froing it transpires what the bride in her head has ordered is 50 black and 50 grey sponge cupcakes as in no buttercream frosting. Where I was suppose to put the picture toppers is still a mystery.

She has seen hundreds of images of my work and I have never produced a nude cupcake. Always have frosting on them.

She has not given me time to rectify the issue. Not that I would as I am not having my name associated with what she thinks she has ordered. Not would I let black sponges out to be eaten as they will taste horrendous but they have so much colour in them can you imagine the additives.

She is now asking for a full refund as I have "screwed up her order" what do I do? I'm my head she has received what she has ordered.

If you guys ordered a black & grey cupcake how would you interoperate that? What she thinks or what I have made her.

I still think you are in the wrong.

She ordered black cupcakes and you gave her 'ordinary' ones, decorated in black/grey icing.

The form asks what flavour cupcake, not what colour cupcake. It can still be/taste vanilla but be black sponge as she was expecting. It's better to do it with a dark base, but not impossible to do it with a vanilla base.

This is your business, the onus is on you to check things out.

She asked you where the buttercream was going - a Big Clue that there was an issue here!

She was 'off' when she picked them up, you should have asked if there was a problem, if they weren't what she was expecting etc.

She ordered black cupcakes and you didn't deliver them, it is your responsibility to make sure you deliver what the client is expecting, not what's in your mind - IMO you do owe her a refund.

Why on earth would you want an anniversary cake as compensation?? A 1 year reminder of how your cake maker fucked up your wedding cakes

I agree you should get this thread deleted. Too identifiable and not that professional.

She'll probably calm down after the wedding is over & she's had time to reflect.

she did ask for black cupcakes though.

Is it her fault that you didn't clarify or that she couldn't tick it on the order?

This is where you have to make it as simple as possible for the customer to communicate what they want.

Not say, well all my photos are different.

So clearer forms, help your customers, it's part of what you provide.

I agree with those who think she decided that she could live with the swirly buttercream (hence she took them but was a bit off) but then got pissed off when she realised the cake was white.

Isn't a cupcake without all the icing just a sponge cake? If that's what she wanted why isn't that what she asked for?

I run my own business, and trust me. No customers are better than bad customers

Absolutely! And do not offer her an anniversary cake - you don't want to be dealing with her again - unless you come to the conclusion that she is genuinely upset but willing to come to some agreement (given her over reaction & demands I figure that's unlikely.

YABU

To me, 'black cupcake' = black coloured sponge.

Vanilla is a flavour, and she'd specifically provided you with black food dye to use for these cakes.

There has been a breakdown in communication, and I would (as a customer) be expecting some form of partial refund as a goodwill gesture.

Hmmm so she accepted them and then complained about them? My BF also runs a cupcake company and she always double checks before she starts baking, sometimes she Googles pics of similar cakes to run by people to make sure they're on the same page IYGM. Maybe you both could have been clearer with eachother but the bride doesn't deserve a full refund.

OP, I think there is ambiguity on your form, because colour of sponge is not included. Also sounds like t & cs were provided on collection, but possibly not before. It's worth ensuring all your paperwork is accurate and watertight, leaving no room for cross wires - protection for you and your business as well as ensuring customers get what they think they're getting.

Given that the customer has already paid (I assume so, since she's asked for a refund), you could leave the ball in her court to contact you again. With a bit of time and the wedding over, she might have a different perspective on the cupcakes. If she used them, they might have been well received even if they weren't what she anticipated. You might be able to come to some sort of agreement between you.

crossed wires!

There's a section for other details, which was left blank.

Does it matter that there is no section for cake colour? This alone covers it.

Any Bride when planning their wedding go very over the top when letting suppliers know what they want. So IMHO this is not your fault at all, you mentioned the butter cream and told her that it would be going on top and she did not dispute that, she came and picked them up, told you she liked them, paid for them and took them away the day before her wedding. If she had felt that they were wrong then it was her responsibility to inform you of this at that point. I think She seems a bit off because she knew exactly what she was going to pull.

I had this when I ran a small deep cleaning company, after finishing a 2 day clean I walked the client through the entire house slowly so she could see what had been done, I pointed areas out that could not be brought back to 100% clean due to bad maintenance, the whole walk through took over an hour, looking in drawers, on top of units, fans etc... At this point she expressed how happy she was with our work.... but on receipt of my invoice refused to pay and listed numerous complaints which I knew were untrue. I issued her with a Court Summons and she soon paid up. I am not suggesting that you go down this road but I would definitely not give her a refund.

Well, regardless if you were in the right or wrong you have now got a thread full of people calling the bride, your customer, a stupid cow, or how awful her wedding sounds and a lot of other things.

So, hope she does not get wind of this thread, or that any future potential customers do so, because as business such as yours does rely somewhat on word of mouth.

I'm afraid I'm another who would assume that coloured cupcakes meant colour of sponge, and coloured icing meant colour of icing, so I would have been asking for black sponge. If you had said the amount of colouring needed would make the thing inedible, I'd have switched to black icing with no problem though (but out of interest how come you can eat red velvet cake, though, don't you need a similar amount of colouring to get that shade??).

Can't you do dark chocolate plus vanilla and get a very dark colour sponge? As a pp said.

Sounds better than black buttercream with just colouring.

There's a good chance she's trying to pull a fast one, but I must admit to being confused about the order. I took it as being black cupcakes ie black sponge plus whatever buttercream colour on top.

Too much ambiguity, leaving you wide open to scamming. I'd offer a refund or partial refund even if it sticks in the craw.

I took it as fully grey cakes and fully black cakes. You said she seemed off at pick up, she probably wasn't expecting a big swirl but let it slide, then when the cakes were bitten into saw the yellow sponge thought it wasn't what she had ordered. You can't see the colour of the sponge on those swirly cakes so she wasn't going to know till the big moment

Jux, red velvet cake isn't supposed to have any food colouring in it. I think it's vinegar that reacts with baking soda to create the colour.

If you google 'black cupcakes' which is what your customer asked for you will see that the cupcakes are indeed black! They are not white with black icing.

You've got it wrong here OP. And your 'contract' doesn't help because vanilla sponge is a flavour.

I make cakes and would not have assumed automatically they would have wanted a black-coloured sponge (I would have asked the question, however, as I'm aware that it's a 'thing') - on a vanilla cake base it's tricky to get right (as others have said, it can come out green unless you put in shedloads of colouring) and I would have advised a dark chocolate cake base to add the colour to in order to get it as dark as possible. I'm surprised you didn't mention offering the bride and groom a trial tasting session to establish which flavour they wanted (which would have been the perfect time for her to say 'yes but they should be black in colour')

Given you spoke about buttercream in advance and she accepted them having looked at them then I wouldn't be offering a refund or an anniversary cake.

For those of you saying uniced cupcakes are dry and boring - you haven't tasted my cupcakes :o I find it rather sad that cupcakes have such a shit reputation on MN, they are really nice if they're made properly...

I have worked with the public for years. Including retail and fulfilling private commissions in the same way as OP.

The moral of the story is ''never assume anything, it makes an ass out of u and me''.

ie: when you are dealing with the public never assume they know what you mean,
never assume you know what they mean without it being VERY clear,
never assume they know what you mean without it being VERY clear and ...

never assume they mean cream coloured when they say vanilla. Which is a flavour.

I think I would have expected actual black sponge, not just black icing on top.

Thanks, gobby, you learn something new every dayas they say

OP, you are the 'professional' and the one in business. Your clients is not. It is up to you to cover all possibilities and ensure that you are clear about what is expected of you. If youduck and dive and try to pretend that it's her fault for being unclear, then really you should get out of the business.

I would expect both sponge and frosting to be black (or grey). If I was baking black sponge I would bake a dark chocolate sponge and add some heat-safe black food colouring (and possibly some orange flavouring if I was worried about the taste of the colour paste).
I would probably expect only a thin layer of icing, sufficient to act as a glue for the photo toppers rather than the swirly turrets one often sees.
I agree that using photo toppers is weirdly self-obsessed and having the cake being not-quite-as-envisioned is not going to ruin anyone's day unless they are basically odd.
Give a partial refund and make sure all specifications are highly detailed and in writing in future...

I had no idea black cake was a 'thing' at the moment, but then I don't run a cake making business.

Agree with posters saying vanilla is a flavour not a colour.

Has the bride actually claimed that you have wrecked her day? Your OP says only that she said you'd screwed the order up, which you appear to have done.

The misunderstanding over buttercream is one thing (and not everyone likes a lot of buttercream, and it is entirely possible that she doesn't like a lot of it, and only wanted the buttercream to fix the toppers down, rather than vast swirls of it), but to have totally the wrong cake underneath (from bride's perspective) is another thing entirely.

I would be annoyed to be expected to,pay for something which I hadn't ordered or wanted. I'd be pissed off at the mistake (with myself as well as the baker, if I hadn't been explicit with what I wanted), but wouldn't claim the whole day had been wrecked. But is also wouldn't expect to pay full price for something which is so far from my expectations, and what I had (presumably) described.