What Questions Should A Consumer Ask A Custom Cake Bakery?
1. Are your cakes frozen prior to decorating?
At Sweet Slice the answer is NO. Everything is made to order.
2. How do I store the finished cake?
In a cool dry place 65 degrees or lower. Can also be stored in the fridge. If stored in a fridge allow approximately 2 hours to return to room temperature before serving. Never eat cold cake, it will taste dry! Allow the moisture to distribute.
3. How do I transport the cake?
Sweet Slice will package your order in the most secure way possible. We will also provide detailed transport instructions before placing the order, as well as, take the time to explain how to transport the cake. We take getting your custom order to your event intact very seriously.
5. What is your payment structure for placement of the order?
At Sweet Slice we accept all major credit cards, cash, and Pay Pal Personal Payment. We take a 50% non-refundable deposit to secure your order/event date. The remaining balance is due upon product completion. Orders placed less than 14 days prior to event, a full payment is required. *not applicable to weddings, please see policy section for wedding payment structure.
6. What is your cancellation policy?
Why are Custom Cakes More Expensive?
The most often exclamation is, "Ooh why is it so expensive for a custom cake?" or some customers requesting to bake and decorate at sub-par budgets. Do not get me wrong, we are considerate and completely believe in having a budget. However, we kindly request that a customer please take into consideration, what goes into making your custom cake. So to the best of our ability,we are trying to help everyone to understand and keep in mind what goes into creating your edible artwork.
It’s just flour and sugar, right?
Not quite, there’s much more to it.
- There so many elements that go into creating your custom cake, the ingredients being only a small part of that but let’s start there. In a standard 3-tier cake, there can be as many as a dozen eggs, 5 pounds of pastry flour, half a cup of real vanilla, several pounds of butter, and several bars of premium chocolate, large quantities of fresh fruit and more! The filling and buttercream may contain 3 or 4 more pounds of butter and several pounds of sugar plus the chocolate or fruit to flavor it. If you have a fondant covering, add about 5-8 more pounds of sugar and butter. It takes approx. 5lbs of finished fondant to simply cover a 3 tier cake (not decorate) .
- Difference between big commercial bakery cakes (ie. grocery store) and home-made cakes. Home-made cakes are baked using tried and tested recipes. They cater to the clients preference. They are designed every time and do not come from a handbook of preset designs. They use the best and freshest ingredients. Commercial bakeries mass produce, flash freeze, and also purchase ingredients in bulk.
- Cake artist’s time. Time is taken when a simple cake consultation is done, be it through emails or face to face. Time is also taken when researching certain designs online and figuring what the customer wants exactly. There is time to bake and create your masterpiece. Custom cakes take 8- 10 hours on average simply to decorate. The prep time takes days.
- You are paying for baking experience in using recipes that are tasty, but can stand up under the weight of being stacked and shaped, structural engineering of the support systems, artistry in decorating, sculpting skills in creating toppers and decorations.
- Now you need equipment. Tiered cake pans in various sizes ranging from 4” to 18” and an oven that will fit the larger pans. In addition a heavy-duty stand mixer, professional grade food colors, dusts, piping bags with specialty tips, cutters, molds and more. Depending on the design of your cake, there can be hundreds of dollars of specialized tools and molds required. There are boards and boxes to safely transport your masterpiece. Let's not forget what runs the equipment, the amount of electricity used. Imagine running the oven for almost 2-3 hours+ for each cake order that we bake every single week.
- Cake artists also have the expenses of marketing, maintaining a web site, and various bridal shows to ensure you can find us! .
We sincerely hope that by reading this future clients wanting to order from Sweet Slice will understand what we go through every time you order a custom made cake from us. Our advice is to have an open mind, have some knowledge of what you desire, but if you don't we will most definitely guide you, and in the end you will have a cake that will be beyond your expectations!
