i'm making our own wedding cake with supermarket prices for ingredients and it will cost way less and certainly will not take 24 hours to make!! 24 hours?!!?
I cant imagine a cake shop being in much business if they are taking 3 working days to make one wedding cake.

Someone else has already suggested same but can I please ask you to keep track of time. I genuinely am curious as to how long it takes someone else to make a cake. It would be great for me if you could post details of the size of cakes you are making. Ingredient costs, parchment paper/brownpaper, driving to and from the supermarket (I charge 10c per km), gas costs (approx. 84c per 30 minutes at 160C), electricity costs if lights etc. are on while you are working. Sugarpaste, boards, dowels, drums and ribbon. Will you be buying or hiring tins?
Would love to see a photograph too.
I'm not being sarcastic or nasty, although I do detect a tone in your reply to me, I genuinely am interested in how long and how much it will cost you to make your cake. Oh, and I should point out that the '24 hours' it takes to make a wedding cake also includes the time it takes to email/quote/make samples/sit with couple and work out a design.

I didn't realise this thread was 2 years old I was just surfing to see what's up with brides at the moment.

Looking forward to photos and costs. Take care.

a lot of the 'time & costs' will be incorporated to other tasks such as weekly shopping, I bake occasionally on sundays for my family/OH which is also good practice, already have a stock of parchment, will be visiting venue the day before anyway - so will bring cake and they are providing a cake stand free, future MiL has already made one layer as its fruit cake which I don't like/dont care for at all. i'll borrow tins, paid less than €10 for the round silver cake bases, have ribbon left over from invites, one cake is no bake so minimal costs and other will bake for less than 1 hour, i'm likely to not use traditional sugarpaste icing, most likely chocolate curls which is probably going to be the most expensive ingredient.
all that extra non cake prep time you mention I don't have apart from looking up recipes which i've used and incorporated to my regular life.

a cake shop should be winning on all this hands down...experience & efficiency at the actual job, specialised premises and utensils, wholesale bulk buying etc.. I understand there are all those extra costs etc esp re set up but that doesn't mean a cake shop is going to charge €20 per bespoke cupcake. I can't imagine a cake shop is only able to muster 2 standard wedding cakes a week.

anyway, I never intended in getting so involved in this thread. wedding cake prices have absolutely gone crazy (most are €400-€700+) and i don't see the justification. It seems the 'wedding' price tag again. I certainly will take pictures and post but you'll have to wait another 2 months

Yeah, y'see I don't incorporate shopping like that as I have to use a wholesaler for specialist ingredients. Will definitely come back to this as really am intrigued.

Exactly! So you get to buy more for less FTW

No. I don't get to buy more for less. The wholesalers is the only place that sells the Belgian chocolate we use. If I want sugarpaste, petal paste etc. I'd drive into Decobake in town. For good ribbon I usually drive to Home Focus in Coolock. None of these ingredients can be bought in Tesco/Dunnes/Superquinn/Aldi or Lidl. That's what I meant by 'I can't incorporate my shopping into my weekly supermarket run.
Seriously, why are you so angry? The emoticons are both ridiculous and insulting when you're trying to have a discussion. I am genuinely interested in the pricing structure of cakes as I make them for a living. I am genuinely interested in why people think it's worth the headache of making their own.
I am not interested in being patronised by a bride who obviously has a chip on her shoulder and a superiority complex.
I now make at least 100 a month fixing cakes that people thought they could make themselves. I don't care that you want to make your own cake, really! It's not that important to me, what I am interested in is how my craft is being lambasted and treated as 'something anyone could do and for far less'.

wholesalers by their nature are going to be cheaper as they are not supermarket prices that the rest of us diy mere mortals will be paying.
i'm not angry..why would I want to be angry in the run up to my wedding?
ill use all the silliest emoticons to that effect also! this is a wedding discussion forum with them to use. if you are insulted by them, that aint my problem
if anything i'm trying to keep somewhat lighthearted!

I was being nice and responding to some of your questions, and forgive me but i'm not going to sit down calculating gas & petrol costs.
I've been to decobake and got sugar paste for my nephews birthday cake I made. it's not that expensive at all. its also only open a couple of months...
i'm sure each trip you make that you can stock up for many supplies or do you take a trip each time you need an ingredient? remember it was you who brought all the finers into discussion.
you mentioned costs of eggs & flour rising...seriously these are low end costs. You did make me laugh at that one.

also I do not find the process a headache at all. i'm quite enjoying it. I take it from your replies that you feel ill do a crap job and want everyone to see what happens when your average joe bride decides to do DIY cake? as long as me, my OH and guests are happy thats all that matters to me...also that I don't have to pay to the hilt for the privilege (oops there I go again!)

whilst i wont go making little flowers or intricate designs on my cake..it doesn't take a master baker to make a cake & with some creative ideas decorating can be done.
I'm getting a 'grooms cake' (aka novelty cake) made as I want it to have quite specific designs which will require someone, like yourself probably, who can do such a task. Its a 12" cake with quite a bit of detail - much more than a wedding cake - and costs less than a 12" plain wedding cake layer on website of cakebox (as an eg. as this thread started about them).
To me that doesn't make sense.

you fancy declaring who you are? I see you are newly joined up to post on this thread only.
or posting pics of your cakes? maybe even before & after pics of you saving those silly brides who dared to make their own wedding cake!

what I am interested in is how my craft is being lambasted and treated as 'something anyone could do and for far less'

I dont think anyone was saying this.

My own cake went down a storm and i'd hardly any left. It tasted great and looked great and became a wow piece. some things money just can't buy. delighted I did it!
its my first wedding cake and first time decorating like this. money costs i'd say €130..time & love about 5-6 hours (over 3 separate days).

Wow this thread really went off a bit !
There's alot of different points thrown in but along the way ..... my two cents worth....
Yes anything with wedding attached is more expensive but wedding stuff usually takes up more of the sellers time with delivery questions tastings consultations pictures etc than say a birthday cake .
A 25% price rise is a bit surprising but the price is still not out of line with the market . An increase out of step like that says more about their pricing policy and business acumen than their attitude to their customers , bit if a jump to make random personal comments about the ladys attitude to their custoimesrs based on this - different with personal experience re refunds I guess.
I hope the posters who were so very forthcoming with their complaints to the lady who runs that cake shop are as upfront in giving it to Tesco , petrol pumps , wedding dress shops, MUA , hairdresers , etc in real life about prices I doubt it somehow .
For the baker - not a good idea to get into an argument with anyone one a board - stick to your PR standard helpful commentary, you were'nt gonna change someones mind whose comments were so polarised from your own .
Yes you can save money by DIYing but noone ever counts their time , stress etc properly ( new caketin , repeat cake if you burn a layer - the bits you had at home anyway - the hours you spent getting recipie or learning to ice it etc , the stress and hassle factor) . Some efforts will be more succesful than others .
I really don't like to hear people dismiss the time and effort of someone's skill because its percieved to be a semi domestic task , e.g. dressmaker - 'sure you'd turn up a pair of trousers in half an hour etc , baker - anyone can make a cake , cleaner , gardner, make up artists etc . Yes we could do these things ourselves to various degrees but it can be done to a professional level too .

Beautiful cake and well done - you've got a real talent there , but sorry , there's no way that took six hours only , baking the three layers , washing up , decorating alone, nevermind prep etc crumb coating ..... three layers ... organising your letters and boards .... shopping .... . If it truly took six hours start to finish completely you should turn professional.

FutureWife wrote:Wow this thread really went off a bit !
There's alot of different points thrown in but along the way ..... my two cents worth....
Yes anything with wedding attached is more expensive but wedding stuff usually takes up more of the sellers time with delivery questions tastings consultations pictures etc than say a birthday cake .
A 25% price rise is a bit surprising but the price is still not out of line with the market . An increase out of step like that says more about their pricing policy and business acumen than their attitude to their customers , bit if a jump to make random personal comments about the ladys attitude to their custoimesrs based on this - different with personal experience re refunds I guess.
I hope the posters who were so very forthcoming with their complaints to the lady who runs that cake shop are as upfront in giving it to Tesco , petrol pumps , wedding dress shops, MUA , hairdresers , etc in real life about prices I doubt it somehow .
For the baker - not a good idea to get into an argument with anyone one a board - stick to your PR standard helpful commentary, you were'nt gonna change someones mind whose comments were so polarised from your own .
Yes you can save money by DIYing but noone ever counts their time , stress etc properly ( new caketin , repeat cake if you burn a layer - the bits you had at home anyway - the hours you spent getting recipie or learning to ice it etc , the stress and hassle factor) . Some efforts will be more succesful than others .
I really don't like to hear people dismiss the time and effort of someone's skill because its percieved to be a semi domestic task , e.g. dressmaker - 'sure you'd turn up a pair of trousers in half an hour etc , baker - anyone can make a cake , cleaner , gardner, make up artists etc . Yes we could do these things ourselves to various degrees but it can be done to a professional level too .

Beautiful cake and well done - you've got a real talent there , but sorry , there's no way that took six hours only , baking the three layers , washing up , decorating alone, nevermind prep etc crumb coating ..... three layers ... organising your letters and boards .... shopping .... . If it truly took six hours start to finish completely you should turn professional.

this thread is over 2 years old and I wasn't part of the initial debate issue. I never dismissed someone's skill and totally recognise that I would never be able to do a sugar pasted cake with intricate little flowers etc but thats fine as I didn't want a cake like that (mainly because I couldn't do it )
this was a cake I could do and it didn't take too much time, it was an enjoyable experience especially the response I got from family & friends. it was brilliant.
I must admit though that the top lay was a fruit cake made by my MiL last year...she makes them all the time and gave me one. i've no interest in fruit cake but the mammies wanted it so thats why I took it off her.
previous choc biscuit cakes took me about 40min to prep (10in) but this one as a 12" took 90min on the tuesday. it was quadruple my normal recipe (from odlums with few add ons). the tin cost €22 I think and was only one I needed to buy.
the middle layer was made wed night and wass 2 lemon cakes (a lemon drizzle recipe I use from bbcgoodfood). instead of the drizzle I made a lemon curd for the 1st time using a recipe from a US website, one of the first google results. the only bit of stress came momentarily when I had 'finished' it to find sugar still sitting in the weighing scales so I made a sugar syrup with a little lemon juice & once dissolved I stirred it in and it was fine - all took under 2 hours.
on thursday I decorated cakes using chocolate cigarillos & flakes I ordered from la rousse foods. I melted white chocolate and used this like 'glue' sticking each one on the edge 1 by 1, filling gaps in the top with more melted white chocolate and spreading the remainder on top.
I trimmed the lemon cakes and made a sandwich with the lemon curd in the middle. I used royal icing to cover the cake completely and stuck on the chocolate around the sides. I did this with the fruitcake too - never used any marzipan and it wasn't missed. I washed raspberries and prepared for transport...took about 2 hours, longer than I thought.
I headed off to the hotel as I was doing anyway as I left my car there overnight. they let me use a satellite kitchen to finish off cake with adding more chocolate on top, putting raspberries & ribbons on (leftovers from invitations) and placing our initials= cake toppers (€13 from ebay) - took 15-20 min max. the hotel assembled cake onto their own cake stand.

things like washing up I did as I went before things got dried in or they were in the diswasher.
I got boards months ago when making a cake for my nephews birthday - and established that I wasn't going to go the sugarpaste route but managed a fun childs cake ok.
shopping with a list took less than 30min - most fun shop ever! and everything I needed seem to have a 'deal' on which was great.
To be honest if the above times were much longer I still would have zero regrets about doing it... was one of the more enjoyable tasks about my day and esp with the great feedback.

On this forum I found it was quite negative towards DIY cakes...and I just want to show it can be done without being a complex process - if you want it complex then go pay for it! from the prices ive seen on cake website, mine would be in the region of €550 which is pretty phenomenal to me but I won't be going into the cake business any time soon. i'm wise enough to to know i'm a one trick pony on this, but that's fine as it was all I needed.

You've Totally misinterpreted me !
I read the whole blog in one go , gave my two cents to the whole lot and included one , rather complimertary bit about your cake . I specifically said there were alot of interesting points etc and sort of generally responded to them . I was really specifically replting to what I felt was a pretty heavy go on the baker who the other posters had given a hard time to , especially as they were looking for a cake to purchase and not actually making their own . I've actually made my own cake and wedding dress . I had gone and searched for a picture form Goya in Galway that looks just like yours , thought you'd be chuffed - it was 600 with four tiers .

a post isn't necessarily just related to the one immediately before it, tried to make that clear in my post- the only bit directed at you was to say what a great job though I was and I skeptical about the stopwatch.

I know what you mean about people being negative about DIY cakes , mine is definitely a bit old school looking ( i thought yours was quite modern and totally looked like a pro could have made it ) , some people won't like mine but thats what I wanted , I was trying to copy the cake my Mom had . I noticed the same responses to DIY invites , wonder if its a case of justifying what they've spent themselves .

Some thread!

Cake box, and every business, can charge whatever they want for a service without having to justify it.
It's up to the customer to shop around and get value.
If a product isn't worth the price, then business will suffer.

Spaced2012, well done on your cake, it looks well. I do think this is one of the best types of diy cake to try, the cigarellos give a good finish for the least amount of hassle.

FutureWife wrote:You've Totally misinterpreted me !
I read the whole blog in one go , gave my two cents to the whole lot and included one , rather complimertary bit about your cake . I specifically said there were alot of interesting points etc and sort of generally responded to them . I was really specifically replting to what I felt was a pretty heavy go on the baker who the other posters had given a hard time to , especially as they were looking for a cake to purchase and not actually making their own . I've actually made my own cake and wedding dress . I had gone and searched for a picture form Goya in Galway that looks just like yours , thought you'd be chuffed - it was 600 with four tiers .

a post isn't necessarily just related to the one immediately before it, tried to make that clear in my post- the only bit directed at you was to say what a great job though I was and I skeptical about the stopwatch.

I know what you mean about people being negative about DIY cakes , mine is definitely a bit old school looking ( i thought yours was quite modern and totally looked like a pro could have made it ) , some people won't like mine but thats what I wanted , I was trying to copy the cake my Mom had . I noticed the same responses to DIY invites , wonder if its a case of justifying what they've spent themselves .

I know you were referring to the whole thread so I took what I thought referred to myself as I have posted more than just the last post before yours. I was trying to outline how I calculated the time. even if the cake took half of my week (which it didnt!), it was still worth every second.
If I could've done more DIY I would have. I met a lot of resistance to own cake..not just here.
Well done for managing your own dress!

Thanks for your compliements

yumyumcake wrote:Spaced2012, well done on your cake, it looks well. I do think this is one of the best types of diy cake to try, the cigarellos give a good finish for the least amount of hassle.

thanks yumyumcake. it was done within a more than reasonable time frame and I enjoyed it all so much that it would be worth it if it took twice that time. It was brilliant having guests enjoy your own homemade cake so much and still commenting on it.
i'd recommend anyone to do it as it doesn't take any specialist skill to do it this way.