To start a home baking / cupcake business?

[skittletittle]

On maternity , we've now decided I don't need to/don't want to go back to work right away. Would love to start a home baking business, but not sure if I'm being delusional.

Assuming the cakes are decent enough.. what pros and cons can you see? Has anyone done this themselves and have any positive or negative advice?

The very first thing you need to do is to find out if it's even legal in your area to sell and prepare food commercially from a home kitchen.

I'm in a Facebook group for bakers, so know a lot of people that have done it :)

This is the best resource I've found on how to do it :)
www.mrsbakerscakes.co.uk/blog/read_49527/business-start-up-check-list.html

It can be quite competitive. You need to price yourself in line with other local bakers (do NOT undercut them by a significant amount) but take into account your skills.

If you want to PM me, I can give you more details on the group but I think you might need to be FB friends with a member to be accepted. I can check that for you and happy to be your "in" if needed :)

Just...gen up on the health and safety stuff you need for certification for your business. It's (rightly) stringent. My cleaning lady is in the process of getting it for the jams/'marmalades/chutneys she and her partner sell at farmers markets etc.

and good luck!

One of my friends tried this. She made wonderful professional looking cupcakes. Unfortunately the time needed to make the cupcakes compared to the maximum you can charge makes it an unviable business proposition.

Do you have the correct hygiene certificates? Have you contacted the Local Authority about licensing?

My mother used to prepare food at home for sale at a WI market and had to do the food hygiene certificates and technically the Local Authority could turn up at any time to inspect her kitchen.

Check out a baker called She Who Bakes - I think she published an e-book on starting a baking business from home!

I would say that the cons are small profit margins, hard work and a very competitive industry. But pros are flexibility, working from home, presumably something you enjoy. If you think there's a gap in the market for you then it could be a great job for a working parent.

What's your aim here? Income, flexible work, something for your CV, career change, keeping brain engaged on something non-baby, something else?

There are a lot of these sorts of businesses near me; my impression is that most of them never really become commercially viable.

I wouldn't bother. There are plenty of places to buy cakes. It's not like it's a market with a gap in it. Plus I can't believe people actually pay those ridiculous prices that people charge for these cakes. The cake business bubble must be due it's time to burst.

Some really great replies thank you!!

My main aim is just to have something non-baby related to be getting on with while I'm not working, it's not for financial reasons fortunately. As long as it can cover what I'm paying out then I'd be happy for it to just be a hobby. I love baking and would love to share that with people.

I haven't looked into, with any depth, what licensing I need but am beginning to now. I think I just wanted to see first whether it was all just a "nice idea" but not really possible.

There's certainly a gap in the market where I am, pretty rural with only such places in the big town about 30 minutes away - I've done my research in that department at least

My SIL set up a business making cupcakes from home some years ago. She found it was very time consuming for the amount of profit you can make. She now does mostly celebration cakes and is trying to get more into wedding cakes as that is where the money is. She is very good at it and now makes good money but it takes up a lot of her time. She has also had a cake making studio built in her garden as all the cakes and equipment absolutely took over all the space her house.

I suspect it would be a lot of work for little / no financial gain, but if you want to do it as a hobby, I'm sure you could enjoy doing it

I wonder if the appetite for cupcakes has dwindled at all?

Anyway, I would specialise in occasion/novelty cakes if I were you, they always seem to be in demand if our local FB page is anything to go by.

"Can anyone make a scale model of the Eiffel Tower by last Friday please? Must be cheap."

In all honesty, home made cup cakes are ridiculously expensive, and you never make back what you have spent on ingredients + time.

I have really recently set up a cake business alongside my full time job. It started out as a hobby but that I wanted to take further, but I haven’t taken the plunge of giving up my guaranteed income and doing full time as it is such a risk. First, you would need to check with your Landlord/mortgage providers etc that you are allowed to sell from your house. You would also need to do the relevant Food Hygiene qualification that allows you to sell your products (you can do this online for about £30 per qualification). You would also need to contact your local Council and let them know what you are doing, they will then come round and do an inspection of your house and it’s a very thorough inspection. You would also need to get Public Liability insurance and register as self-employed as you would have to declare your earnings and pay tax (assuming you are hoping to do enough output to make a decent income from it) Hope all this helps

If you have a local market, you may be better off getting a pitch there a couple of days per week and selling cupcakes that way, plus a school fairs etc. I think there is a bit more profit in that.

I know people who do sell occasion cakes etc, but as a sideline rather than a viable stand alone business, the profit margins are just too slim to sustain someone.

As a consumer of over priced cake and cupcakes, I find it hard to imagine you can't make money this way....its like £3.50 for a 1/12 of a cake that I reckon doesn't have more than £10 of ingredients at the absolute most. Cupcakes are perhaps slimmer margins with a similar outlay for 24 but only 1.50 each.

I think the problem is volume...you want to be earning at least 50 quid a day, which is 3 big cakes or 72 cupcakes a day sold....that is going to get quite old quite fast imo.

I love making cakes and do cake for 250 people once a year for a work event. Its fun playing baker for a weekend, but I wouldn;t want to get up the next day and do it all again....

Also meant to say I would steer away from the cupcakes and try to do novelty/celebration/customised cakes and wedding cakes if possible as there is a lot more demand for things like this. Make sure you don’t undersell yourself and have faith in yourself and your ability. You will always get the people who say “it’s a cake you can buy one from Asda for £10” but they never realise how much time and effort goes into each cake, as well as experience/equipment/electric/ingredient costs etc

I think you'd be running at a loss. You can buy lovely cupcakes very cheaply in most supermarkets. Being rural means you'd have to factor in delivery and transportation cause I certainly wouldn't drive for miles to collect them. Shop bought cakes have a long shelf life too, home made are inedible within 48 hours.

Some really interesting ideas to think about - thank you all very much for taking the time to reply 👍🏼

What's the largest batch of cupcakes you've made so far? I love baking and regularly made around 24/36 to take in for work birthdays. Then I made around 60 cupcakes for a friend's party and the difference in time and effort was astonishing...I'd never consider baking that volume again!

Are you planning on having your child in childcare while you work or thinking of doing the baking while minding them? If it's the latter then don't do it.

If it's just something to do OP and you don't need the money, have you thought about baking for your local branch of 'Free Cakes for Kids'?
We make birthday cakes for children who wouldn't otherwise get a birthday cake- it's really enjoyable and you can do as few or as many as you like.

I'm a pastry chef, and if I were to start a home based business, I would avoid making cakes or cupcakes! Maybe you could focus on gourmet biscuits and offer lovely gift baskets/boxes, etc.

I visited a food fayre in a town recently, cupcakes were £2.50 each, I didn't buy one, because I thought the price was too high. However, the person may have had to have paid for their stall to be in that market, so the price may have included that.