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.

To me black cupcakes = black sponge and black buttercream.

What she actually wanted is what i would call a muffin not a cupcake.

She knew you were putting buttercream on them so why on earth didn't she say anything then or when she picked them up

I agree with others to refund her half and next time be very specific and confirm the order in writing.

This woman thinks the OP has wrecked her wedding because the cupcakes are white, not black, and they have icing on the top.

She isn't mature enough to get married. Is it too late to alert the registrar?

A wedding party is supposed to be held so that a couple can celebrate the start of their marriage with the people who are important to them. What it so often seems to be instead is a masterclass in how to throw away thousands and thousands of pounds on pointless fripperies. No guest will care what colour the sponge is.

*Hell fire!

Tell her there's a reason you don't see black sponge cake, ever!

Did she come across as a bit of an air head?*

was there any need for this? If you bothered to read the thread you would see actually black is possible. Why would she come across as an airhead for wanting something that she would have seen?

Hmm when l read your thread, my immediate thought was who want to eat black sponge- so l guess it has been a massive miscomunication on both parts

Black cakes and coloured cakes in general are a thing, a quick Google shows you that!

I saw an awesome black cake made with Orange cake pop balls in it for Halloween, it looked amazing and is on my list to try!

YANBU. Sounds like you attempted to contact her to clear things up a few times and she ignored you. But since you're a small business perhaps it's worth making some compensation to her rather than deal with the possibly very damaging poor publicity? And I guess it's a lesson to be absolutely explicit about the product next time ...

I'd imagine she's more annoyed about the cupcakes being white than them having buttercream on.They're the wrong colour and probably the wrong flavour given most people do black from chocolate or coffee batter.

She wouldn't have seen the colour of the cakes due to the icing (which she also wasn't keen on) so saying she accepted them at the time is wrong,she couldn't possibly know.

I would expect a cake maker to be aware of all the above and tbh I wouldn't use the op due to their lack of knowledge and lack of process to ensure they are doing the right thing.

Oh,were the photo toppers done on rice paper or were they the thin icing ones btw?

Here.

Why not have a diagram? Or draw up a picture, or make a sample batch?

That's an awesome cake 5mad

Also, give her a few days to calm down then get in touch to discuss it. It's ridiculous of her to say it ruined her day, but emotions are no doubt running high at the moment. Could be that what she wants is to be heard and have her disappointment acknowledged.

Miscommunication.

No one is right or wrong.

However, you are the professional and it is your business, so you should have been absolutely clear what she wanted. Clearly not as you were texting as you were in the process of baking.

I would offer her a 25% discount.

I also don't think that her accepting them at the time is really a sign of anything - presumably it is way too late for her to source alternatives for her wedding, plus it doesn't sound like there was any way of her knowing that the sponge underneath was white if you had frosted them with buttercream. She is getting married and probably has a hundred things to do this week - she may have been able to put up with the unexpected buttercream if the cakes had been what she wanted, but it sounds as though what she got was very different from what she had imagined, so I can understand her being a bit upset.
That's not to say that you should refund in full and leave yourself out of pocket, but this could be a valuable lesson in how to ensure that this kind of situation doesn't arise again.

If she wasn't happy with them then she should have spoken up when she collected them.

In the future have an order form which specifies all the details and get the client to sign it. Then if they go back on it you had proof of what they ordered.

If it was for a party fair enough, but a wedding cake is usually quite a big deal. If she's ordered these based on communication that is at best questionable then she's been a bit lax imo.
Cake tasting is a thing. I don't know anyone who has bought their wedding cake without seeing pics of it/showing the maker pics of it/tasting it or something along those lines.
If something like cupcakes had the potential to "ruin" her wedding then you'd be a bit more specific when ordering. Do you do a lot of weddings op? Only asking as my friend makes amazing cakes but very few weddings, wedding cakes tend to be far more specialised, and far far pricier!

Yes an unfortunate miscommunication. I am afraid I would however have assumed black sponge if I asked for a black cake. My daughter made black sponge cupcakes (with orange icing) for Halloween last year, they were great sellers at school cake sale. They were dark grey rather than totally black tbh, but they tasted fine.

If you Google 'black cupcakes' it's all black sponge that comes up in images. Looks good, but wouldn't fancy eating one, you're right.

She could have communicated better with you, and is obviously a twat for accusing you on ruining her wedding, but...

I am self employed in a very different field, but have had a few instances of learning about the importance of briefing the hard way like this.

It's really up to you to make sure you have the right brief, and ask every conceivable question. Different people think and communicate differently. You need to work around this.

I would try to take this as a positive learning experience (I have!). You need to really think how you take briefs from people, and how to make them ultra clear.

I would recommend coming up with a list of questions to ask about every aspect (no question is too stupid!) and then ALWAYS putting the final brief down in an email, along with your terms and conditions, and asking for sign off. Without sign off, I would never start work.

Dare I say, the above particularly applies to preoccupied, busy brides.

In this instance? I think you should refund fully. Because (a) your reputation (b) I don't think black cupcakes were an unusual ask, looking at the web, and you really should have known that if you're offering professional baking (c) It's an understandable misunderstanding, but the onus was on you to get the brief right, again as the professional - you didn't ask the right questions.

But what type of weirdo has BLACK cakes at a bloody wedding?

Does she look like Robert Smith out the Cure?

I had a similar issue a few years ago with a bride when she came to collect her wedding cake. She arrived in - seemed quiet but when asked she assured me that she was happy with the cake.

About two hours later I get a phone call from her partner saying how upset she was with the cake and he listed off its faults. None of which I felt were true. To cut a potentially long story shorter - I did not refund them.

It had a huge negative impact on my business .... and even though I can totally see your point, and the customer did take her time in telling you she was not happy (why not do it there and then on collection?) I think if you want to continue in this business it might be prudent to offer her some small compensation. Maybe not a full refund, but a good will gesture would do you more good than her.

I would have assumed the cakes themselves were to be black too so I'd say the initial chat was the point at which things should have been clarified.

I am however quite at the notion of it being inflated into a 'wedding wrecker'. The guests won't notice or care however I think on this occasion you should probably make some sort of placatory gesture. Maybe half the cost?

I would assume black sponge, as if she just wanted normal cupcakes, and had already provided you with colouring to save money, she'd have just made them herself?

I think you have to take this on the nose and learn to communicate via email using images etc to clarify the order