To think you don't assume the cake is for everyone.

[Alice6]

Last night I baked a cake. It was a small loaf cake that my colleagues and I had been talking about and I said I would give it a go. It took me quite a while to make and the ingredients weren't cheap. I brought it in and said to one of my colleagues "Sandra, I finally baked it!, would you like a slice? There's a knife here." Pointing to the table where we sit. As she was cutting her piece a few people stood behind her. I hadn't realised that's what they were hanging around for until I looked around and saw most of it gone. I work with about 100 people and about 75% of them use this staff room so I am not making cake for nearly 75 people when I want to treat the few colleagues that I am close to. I wouldn't mind making enough for everyone if there was only 10 of us for example so not to exclude a few people but not this many! AIBU to think you don't just assume you are entitled to a share of something when you haven't even been offered it? When people bring in treats for everyone they will leave them near the microwaves on the worktop with a note not just a tiny cake on a table! I felt too awkward telling them to leave it alone when they had already taken most of it. I'm annoyed that the people I made it for didn't get any after the effort I made. Lesson learned: keep cake in a locked box at break times when you work with locusts!

YABU

If you leave the cake with a knife in the shared staff kitchen people will assume it's been brought in to share. It's pretty common workplace etiquette - food for sharing is left out in communal spaces.
If you want to share it with a group of workmates, slice it and hand it out yourself.

I would assume that if it’s in the kitchen, it’s for everyone.
If it was for a few people from one team, I would have left the cake on my desk

I would have assumed it was for everyone if you left it in the kitchen.

In the place I work if food goes on the communal table then its assumed its for everyone.

If its specifically for someone then it doesnt go on the table

Never show food in communal areas unless you want to lose it!

Pointing to the table where we sit.

I don't think even if you sit in the same spot every day, that turning up with a cake would have gone unnoticed.

If the food is only for your team, you should be handing it out quietly, not having it cut visibly in the communal kitchen.

Weird on all parts.

I wfh most of the time so I usually I have to fight the DC off food.

I do I go into the office (larger open plan, approx 60 people occasionally) so i find this odd. No one would ever assume they were entitled to cake left in the welfare hubs. If people lined up (they wouldn’t) for cake , i would have no problem among “aww sorry, this is for xxxx team”

If it were left out people would ignore it unless a sign was there.

People are very respecttful here, and i dont think we are unusually corporate and well behaved.

I'm not sure why you wouldn't have just brought her in one slice, I've never heard of anyone bringing in a cake and offering it to one person. I see you why you are upset though as the cake wasn't for them but in every job I have worked cake left in a communal area will be gone very quickly.

Just take a few slices in and hand them out to the select few. Putting a whole cake in a communal area looks like you're willing to share it.

If you put it on the table in a communal area people will assume it’s first come first served. If it was only for specific people you should have sliced it and dished it out.

If you only want your team to have it, it never goes near the communal areas, it stays in your team area.

I agree it's fair game if it's the communal area.

Keep it in your area if it's just for the people in your department.

A little teensy bit unreasonable maybe, but I can see why you'd be upset - if there's clearly not enough to go around for everyone, I would think it rude of people not to ask first.
Handing a slice each to the people you wanted to share it with would be better, if there's a next time.

I can see why you’re annoyed but I think if you’ve left the cake out in a communal staff room then it’s unsurprising it was eaten as it’s unlikely to be obvious. If you’re bringing in treats for only a handful of people then you need to hold on to the cake and slice and give it out to those you want to share it with, not leave it out on the table and be audibly heard encouraging someone to cut herself a piece.

You should have cut her portion at home or at work and then pack the cake away. Not leave it out in the open as if it was communal.

Well this was bound to happen!

What you should of done was slice the cake and hand out to your team, next time do just that?

I think it’s a bit unreasonable to expect people to know that you’d only made the cake for certain people

It was for multiple people not just the two of us so the others it was made for did miss out. The thing is it wasn't in 'the communal area' where people put food that can be shared. Yes, it was a communal area being the staff room but that shouldn't give someone the right to take food that doesn't belong to them. Food has to be contained to these areas as we don't work at a traditional office space so dishing out cake at desks wouldn't be an option. I just found it rude and rude when they didn't even say thank you.

I agree that if you wanted it to be just for your team, you should have sliced it at home and handed the slices out individually before you entered the communal area.

That seems so mean to just appoint a few “cake buddies”.
I work with about 100 people too, maybe 30 on at a time. It’s a cake free-for-all.

Should Be in a tin with a note on saying ‘alices cake’ in that case! Or hidden to one side, left with your bag etc?
In my work place, any food through the door is fair game unless labelled or in your bag. We’re a bunch of pigs though...

Hard lesson learned there, OP.

In now very very keen to know what cake was !!

looks bit rude allowing one person a slice and not others who were there. I'd assume if you brought the whole thing it was fair game

This.

I agree it was a bit presumptuous of your workmates OP, but it's just cake and maybe you shouldn't have brought the whole thing in if you wanted to keep some back.

Yabu.

The way you did it is excluding.

You could have just cut some up and given it to them individually, no fuss or attention drawn.

They didn't even thank you?! Good grief. Sandra should have kept hold of the knife and fought them off. You can't feed a hundred gannets from one little cake unless your name starts with J...

DD used to take cake in for anyone and everyone in her (smallish) staffroom and have odd people inspecting it warily and asking whether it was sugar-free or gluten-free or dairy-free and being sniffy if it wasn't. She felt like saying, "It's cake and it's free and I made it out of the goodness of my heart so take it or leave it but don't grumble!"

Entitlement is the curse of the 20teens, I think.

With all due respect though OP, it IS a communal area! A staff room/kitchen/eating area or whatever you call it, where everyone gathers to eat IS a communal area! If you put a whole cake on a table, with a knife next to it, and no explicit written instruction card saying KEEP OFF, THIS CAKE IS ONLY FOR MY FRIENDS...then it's game on I'm afraid 🤷‍♀️ In my place, you snooze, you loose!