To think no good deed goes unpunished

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Please tell me if IABU...

I was asked to run a fundraiser for a group my DC attends. It's a class to teach something I do professionally, and I have done for many years. All good, until it came to setting the ticket price - the treasurer looked on my website and saw how much I usually charge for a session. But this is in a village hall, not the venues I'd usually use, which cost much more to hire. I'd thought we could charge less than I usually do, as the experience won't be the same.
But maybe I was wrong: Tickets went on sale and have sold out.
I said I'd buy the materials and invoice them. No need, says the treasurer, and asks me to send her a list.
The session is on Saturday and the ingredients have arrived - with loads missing and much cheaper quality than I'd usually use. There's no way the food we are making will look or taste the same. I rang tonight and she isn't budging - says my list was too expensive and would eat up their profits. In total, the ingredients I wanted were about 25% of the ticket price. I'm giving my time and equipment for free.
Any other circumstances and I'd walk away, but I feel bad for the people who have bought tickets.
What should I do?

The fact that it's in a village hall suggests the OP lives in a small community, if it's anything like the places I've lived luckily it will be easy to her to tell people the truth and it will soon get round

If you messaged the whole committee my guess is that the right ingredients will appear, ,there aren't going to be many people who think squirty cream is a suitable alternative to clotted and they won't want all the hassle of the complaints from the attendees or the hassle of cancelling

I hope you get a response op. What a CF she is.

Stand firm. I would be very annoyed to attend something I’d paid for that was substandard. I’d probably also blame the teacher (and not the administrator) so you’re absolutely right to think it would affect your reputation.
Around 75% profit and they’re trying to cut costs, it’s ridiculous.

Also- a cheaper alternative would be sainsburys unsalted butter instead of Yeo valley, baking spread is not an alternative it’s a different product!

it is your reputation on the line

Treasurer greedy cow.

You are right though no good deed goes unpunished. I have a friend who is an amazing artist. I used to think she was difficult as when she does charity / community events she is very particular and controlling over the process. It took me a while to realise that it’s her reputation, livelihood but also a commitment to her art. She will do charity stuff but only in her own way. People have to respect that. She once told me that she won’t be anyone’s “craft bitch”! She is not willing to compromise and hence be punished!

Cheaper ingredients for cooking tastes or makes no difference, flour is flour same with the sugar!
What are you planning on making?

Read the thread!

You can taste the difference between margarine and butter in a dish and there is a big difference between squirty cream and normal cream too.

Have you read OPs updates?

Margarine is disgusting and not a comparable replacement for butter, squirty cream is not clotted cream.

OP I know you shouldn't have to, but could you buy some of the stuff yourself. Price it up and submit the receipt to the whole committee ?
Say that their options are either you cancel - which reflects badly on both of you - or you buy the ingredients needed and get refunded.

Insist that you can't deliver the experience unless you purchase extra ingredients to bolster the low quality ones.
Stand your ground. Your reputation is at stake.
Call a meeting if you have to.

The purchaser should take possession of all the margarine herself and use it in her own sandwiches.

To think that a recipe can swap butter for margarine or clotted cream for spray cream is ludicrous.

You're obviously not an award winning cook. You can get away with cheap flour cheap sugar and even cheap spices (Asian shop ones) can often be better than eg Barts
However it's the fat that gives flavour - margarine is not a full flavour substitute for butter, and behaves differently on melting/cooking. Ditto cream substitutes (of which squirty cream is one)

If she’s so knowledgeable and so sure of herself, why isn’t she running the event herself.
Thats because she needs your good reputation to draw people in …and it’s worked.
So continue to stand your ground OP. Don’t risk losing your reputation.
Go to the Chair of the committee with your reasoning if needs be, so that the treasurer has to then explain her miserable miserly self to the whole committee.

Having a think about this, the issue is at the minute this discussion is purely between you and the treasurer.

I would email the entire committee and set out what has happened. Ask the chair to authorise you to buy the ingredients needed and get a refund or you can't go ahead as it will adversely impact your professional reputation.

That’s dreadful - it’s your reputation she has put in the line. No way can you accept such dreadful replacement ingredients, and how rude just to buy them without consultation with you.

FYI yes I have read the thread and I have not seen it stated what they’re making!!!

I substituted margarine, a good quality one , and infact some people prefer it depending on what I make, and the only thing that I wouldn’t substitute would be the cream

I’d go out and buy what was needed and battle with her afterwards. The clotted cream you’ll definitely need. It’s your reputation at stake. They shouldn’t have asked you to do it if they weren’t willing to provide correct equipment. 75% profit (taking off any oven heating costs) is decent

OP the reason the tickets sold were that people were interested and wanted to see you.You cannot afford to compromise.Stand firm.

I would buy all the ingredients again and this time take the hit. And just say I’m not putting my reputation on the line, I’d rather be out of pocket than look like an amateur. What kind of moron thinks squirty cream does the same as clotted cream?

Lots of good advice here, OP. I hope it empowers you in your dealings with this CF.

It's things like cheap catering margarine in place of butter, cans of uht squirty cream instead of clotted cream etc.

OMG they must be mad, and I agree with PPs that this is your reputation at risk and there's no reason you should sacrifice it so they can make a bit more money

I hope it can be worked out - if it can't she'll almost certainly blame you for "letting them down" which is damaging in itself - but there's no way I'd do it using rubbish

I clean for a living. If I offered my services for a charity raffle, I do it not only to help the charity, but because it's great advertising for my business where I get to showcase my skills and get my name out there.

I only use professional products and materials that I've carefully selected over the years because of their quality and superior results.

If the charity said "give us a list of what you use and we'll buy them for you", and I ended up with an inferior 99p all purpose spray from Poundstretcher and one cloth & one duster, I couldn't do my job to anywhere near the high standard I usually do. It would in all honesty, be a really shit job!

So, that's my reputation down the pan! A reputationIve spent years building up. I've tried to showcase my skills and expertise, but haven't been able to because of inferior, and not enough, products and materials I would normally.l use. Why would anyone want to recommend me to friends, or write glowing reviews online, or book me again?

So, on that basis, I'd cancel. Because they are putting my business reputation at risk.

It's all good helping out a charity on one occasion, but not at the expense of your business reputation suffering in the longterm. That's unreasonable of the charity to expect.

And quite frankly, there's nothing worse than someone who thinks they know your job better than you do, telling you its possible do it just as well 'for cheaper' because its 'only cleaning / only cooking / only whatever'