Never lucky, Always blessed: To bake or not to bake...

...that is the question!

A year or two ago, I toyed with the idea of making and decorating cakes to sell. So I made up a business on a whim and baked & sold cakes for three or four occasions. It was definitely a learning experience. I don't think business decisions should be made on a whim ;)

I learned that this is a time consuming process! I also learned that unless I wanted to work for pennies, I needed to consider the cost of supplies when setting prices. And my factor in my time, unless I want to make $3 per hour. Which might not make my cakes as affordable as I'd hoped. I learned that I liked having my weekends free more than I liked earning a few bucks completely trashing my kitchen. I found out that I needed to pay attention to licensing and copyright laws, which meant that I couldn't legally sell a cake based on an existing character.

It wasn't long before I stopped making cakes for money. Except for my kids, and for my friends' baby showers and a few birthday parties. I got burnt out. Actually, it felt more like sugared out. I can still taste the sickly-sweet coating on my teeth from testing icing.

This past weekend, I made a batch of birthday cupcakes for my friend's son's 1st birthday. And I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed researching and sketching out different ways to make lion cake, and I enjoyed decorating. I was pleased with the fact that the whole process (including baking time and clean up!) only took 2 hours and 30 minutes. I made about $10/hour if you factor in the cost of supplies. And perhaps most importantly, I had fun with it.

Little birthday lions

So, I've been toying with the idea of making cakes now and then. For money. I like the idea of making cupcakes as they are easy, quick and cute. Cupcakes don't require specialty pans. I like the idea of matching decorations or going off a simple plan rather than trying to create some sort of character themed dessert that might infringe on copyright law. I like the idea of spending a few hours here and there working, rather than an entire weekend.

I'm trying to decide what to do next. I would greatly appreciate some input in this process too.

Is my work worth paying for?

How much would you pay for two dozen individually decorated cupcakes?

Would you prefer cupcakes or layered cakes?

How would licensing/copyright laws affect your decision to buy cakes?

Feel free to visit my Facebook page to see more samples of my work or to offer your input there: Smiley Cakes by Melissa Franzen.

Thank you! Below are some samples of recent work I've done...