To think this is too much to pay for a cake???

[AmIjustreallymean]

We're having a double celebration (not a wedding) but we thought we'd get one cake to celebrate both events. Cake in the shape of numbers but decorated in two different styles.

The baker was recommended to me and is consistently recommended on our local social media. I don't want to hassle them and i might not get anyone else as the event is soon. But the quote is for 3 figures, ie over £100!!!!

The last cake I bought was £65, nearly 8 years ago so I'm a bit surprised. Am I being really mean and this is a reasonable price?

I personally wouldn’t pay it BUT do appreciate that a cake would take several hours to bake and decorate, and there’s two to do.. so £100 plus is probably right for a professionally made cake.

It didn't even look that good, the edges weren't crisp and just a bit sad. I'd try to buy a supermarket version next time for less than half the price and decorate it myself. The taste was probably better than supermarket bland but still disappointing.

Your cake would be tiny is they cut two numbers out of a square cake. Maybe discuss and see if there is a way to make one smaller cake instead as it does sound like you are getting 2 now.

Yes/No its reasonable/expensive to pay £151/£999 for a cake

My sister is a cake maker and you’d be surprised at how much the ingredients for cakes have gone up. Butter alone has gone from £1.20 a block to £2.20. And then you are asking the baker for their time, their expertise, their immense skills, plus the cost of heating, lighting, refrigeration, delivery, plus all the others bits on a cake you don’t think about (box, board, dowels, toppers) and it’s a personalised cake, no sorry, TWO personalised cakes, it all soon adds up.

My daughter had a mermaid themed cake and a dozen matching cupcakes for her birthday this year. That cost £80, and that was with family discount (my sister never charges me for her time for our cakes)! My son just had a cake for his and that was still £65.

Well, you can make your own; buy or hire specific 'number' baking tins to make a cake in the form of a number; you can buy a cake from any supermarket, and add numbers - sometimes in the form of candles; you can buy a plain decorated cake from many supermarkets and decorate yourself;
So many alternative options.

Yeah all edible - the roses are from my dads garden - pesticide free (if you are so inclined) and of course I’d suggest taking the gold wrappers off the Ferrero Rochers ;) but yes it has buttercream and chocolates, meringue drops and macarons

£100 for a bespoke cake sounds cheap to me. Mum has made literally hundreds of cakes and depending on which kind of cake the ingredients alone can cost nearly that much. E.G. sil asked my Mum to make her wedding cake as shop bought ones were in excess of £300. Mum agreed and said she would charge for ingredients only, which totalled £80. The cake was amazing, as Mum's cakes always are, yet sil resented paying the cost. Had Mum charged fully, it would have been similar price to shop cake.

doh! it's 2 cakes effectively!

@IDidntKnowMyOwnStrength Ditto. One bespoke cake I made had sugar moulded flowers which took 160hrs to make (I know- it was a lot of individual fiddly flowers) How much an hour should I pay myself? Not mention costs!!!

I made more money teaching it at nightclasses

My brother in law made a tall single tier cake for me and the ingredients/decorations alone were £50!

That doesn't seem unusually expensive to me, but YANBU to not want to pay that much for a cake. Homemade ones are usually just as nice, even if they don't look as professional. You can buy or even hire the number baking tins.

Update - so I read and listened to all the wisdom and advice on here. Then I politely messaged the baker and apologised that my original idea was out of my budget but could she do something else? She could - it's now a single cake and it took £75 off the price. I paid an extra £10 for a slightly bigger cake and the total price was under £100.

Once I get my cake, I can post pics 😀

Thank you for all the help, advice and suggestions.

The only time I ever ordered cake for a birthday we were in France and on a boat. I went into a random bakery at 5:30 and asked to pick up a chocolate birthday cake for a nine-year old at 1030. It was awesomely good, but the filling/icing was real cream not buttercream. I wouldn't bother in the UK. It's all about the photo, and nothing to do with how it tastes.

That sounds like an excellent solution, OP. Well done for taking the comments on board and changing your viewpoint, it's hard to do that even if it's just about cake! For what it's worth I think your replies have been very gracious.

Thank you very much, that's very kind of you. I realised I hadn't been clear but I didn't want to out myself or my baker (and piss them off!)