Caught between the desire to bring happiness through their creations and the harsh reality of limited time and self-doubt, they struggle to maintain the joy that baking once gave them. The love for spontaneous, heartfelt cakes is challenged by the need to set boundaries, revealing the fragile line between passion and obligation.
I’m a hobbyist baker but my full time job is engineering consulting. There’s more money in the engineering side; when I want to pick up extra hours of work, I’m gonna do engineering work.
But I genuinely like making cakes for friends or for events as a surprise! But I don’t always, sometimes I’m just too busy to make one, it’s just something I do if I happen to have a free day before a get together.
I like making them as surprises because if I screw them up, there’s no pressure to bring something.
But as of recently a bunch of people, have asked me if I can make cakes for different events. And I started just saying no, because I don’t have the time. Plus I don’t know if I could do designs other people make justice, I really just make whatever I’m feeling and kinda wing it.
But people got so annoyed by that, saying stuff like ‘but you made a cake for (other person)” or “I’m not asking for anything hard!”
So I started saying that for special requests, I’m making cakes for commission, and that I can send them my pricing structure if they’re still interested.
My pricing structure is really structured around what it would cost to make it worth it to me, to spend a day making a cake instead of spending it on my main job… So my rates are:
Customer pays the cost of ingredients.
A base hourly rate of $150 (Minimum 3 hours)
If the “deadline” is in under 48 hours my hourly rate is $250
Soo… After I set my commission rates, most people will be like “nevermind” when I mention a commission at all, before I even get into prices. With only two exceptions.
My aunt Jess who I’m not really close to came up to me at Christmas and asked me if I could make a cake for her friend’s party. I said I’m only doing commission work right now but I could send my pricing breakdown.
She said sure then she got really rude saying that my cakes were nowhere near that good to charge that much and that she could get better at the bakery.
I said that she should go to the bakery then, they would have something nice!
She got frustrated with me and said she didn’t want a chain store bought cake, and I said there were some non chain bakeries in the nearby city. She said I was missing the point and that my prices were absurd and nobody would pay that.
I said that was okay, I had enough business through my main job.
Next my cousin asked me if I could make a cake for her kids birthday party, she said my prices were horrible, for a kids party? I said that kids would like a grocery store cake just as much, I was sure the party would be great whatever cake she got!
She said she didn’t want a grocery one, she wanted one of my custom designs. I said that seemed like overkill for a kid’s party. She said that nothing but the price was overkill and that I was taking advantage.
Conclusion
The original poster (OP) enjoys baking as a hobby but has recently faced pressure from friends and family to provide custom cakes for events, which conflicts with their professional time constraints and desire to keep baking low-pressure. In response to this demand, the OP implemented a high-rate commission structure designed to make taking on baking jobs comparable in value to their engineering work, leading to significant pushback and accusations of being greedy or taking advantage.
Is the OP justified in setting professional-level rates for a hobby service to protect their primary career and personal time, or do the expectations of friends and family for casual favors override the OP’s need to establish clear, monetarily fair boundaries?
Here’s how people reacted:
Yes your family is because they’re not accepting no for an answer.
But I think you’re over the top way of responding is kind of a jerk move. You need to just say “I will not make cakes for people who ask me. I only make cakes when I feel like it. And if you keep asking me, I’m still going to say no.”
Or refer them to a bakery that makes really good cakes. But the fact that they’re looking at your prices suggest that they are willing to pay you, And that should be considered a compliment. So that’s why I’m giving you this response.
You aren’t pricing at what it’s worth to them: you’re pricing at what it’s worth to you. NTA
“With my job I just don’t have time to make special orders for people, sometimes I’ll bake if I feel like it and have to time”.
“The cakes are really labor intensive and cost a lot in materials, so I have to charge a lot to make it worth my time. I totally understand if it’s too expensive for you, I know it’s a lot of money, and you can probably get one a lot cheaper at one of the bakeries in town.”
Btw your aunt & cousin both belong in /r/choosingbeggars
Those around you did not listen when you said “no”, so you gave them a reason to say “no”.
If you are taking a day off to make someone a cake, you should get paid for it.
You don’t “owe” anyone a cake for free or to take up your time for them, when you had been doing it as a gift/fun thing.
If you do anything, and I mean ANYTHING creative as a hobby and are even remotely good at it, everyone around you expects to do it for free and has a hard time hearing “no”. You just took the bull by the horns and found a way out to keep your hobby a hobby. Good job OP!
“No, I only make cakes when I feel like it”
“C’mon, I’ll pay you”
“OK, 500$”
“That’s too much, it’s like you don’t even want to make me a cake”
“Exactly.”
“That’s selfish, you’re selfish”
😶
I do the same thing with my monetized hobbies.
As a hobby baker myself, yes your prices are extremely high and as a result I’m going to start doing this. It’ll save so much time over saying no, then no again and a third no.
“I want one of your cakes. But they’re not that good. But I still want one.”
NTA and sounds like your strategy is working.
You don’t have to explain yourself. Just say no. That’s easy. You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone.