Cake pricing calculator
Work out what a cake really costs you, including your time, and the price per cake and per serving that leaves the margin you want. Free and no sign-up. It all runs in your browser, so nothing you type is saved or sent anywhere.
Price every cake on your menu, properly
This calculator prices one cake at a time and leaves out your overheads. The Popkiln Bakery Recipe Costing sheet (Google Sheets) does the rest:
- Unlimited recipes in one list, all feeding one overview.
- Adds your hourly rate and monthly overheads to every piece.
- Converts cups and spoons to grams, with 25 common baking ingredients already listed.
- Three pricing methods side by side, plus profit per hour of your time.
- Flags products you sell below cost or below your target margin.
- Scales any recipe up or down.
How to price a cake
A cake's price has to cover four things: ingredients, your time, the box and board, and a margin on top. In the example above, an 8 in round two-layer cake has $21.02 of ingredients, $45.00 of time (2.5 hours at $18.00 an hour) and $2.00 for the box and board: $68.02 in all. At a 60% margin that is $170.25 for the cake, or $8.51 for each of its 20 party servings.
Why time matters most for cakes
In that example, time is 66% of the cost. A price based on ingredients alone, even "ingredients times 3" ($63.07 here), would not cover it. Decorated and tiered cakes take longer still, so count every hour: baking, cooling, filling, decorating and cleaning up.
Price per serving
Many cake makers quote per serving, so a bigger cake costs more in a way customers understand. The calculator divides the cake's price by the servings for the pans you pick. To quote a per-serving price for future orders, price one typical cake here and use its per-serving figure as your rate.
Cake servings by pan size
Party servings are slices about 1½ x 2 in; wedding servings are thinner, about 1 x 2 in. Figures are for a tier 3 to 6 in tall (two layers); a cake under 3 in tall gives about half. Source: Wilton's cake serving guide.
| Pan | Party servings | Wedding servings |
|---|---|---|
| Round 4 in | 8 | 8 |
| Round 6 in | 12 | 12 |
| Round 8 in | 20 | 24 |
| Round 9 in | 24 | 32 |
| Round 10 in | 28 | 38 |
| Round 12 in | 40 | 56 |
| Round 14 in | 63 | 78 |
| Round 16 in | 77 | 100 |
| Square 6 in | 12 | 18 |
| Square 8 in | 20 | 32 |
| Square 10 in | 30 | 50 |
| Square 12 in | 48 | 72 |
| Square 14 in | 63 | 98 |
| Square 16 in | 80 | 128 |
| Sheet 7 x 11 in | 24 | 32 |
| Sheet 9 x 13 in | 36 | 50 |
| Sheet 11 x 15 in | 54 | 74 |
| Sheet 12 x 18 in | 72 | 98 |
Margin is not markup
A 60% markup on a $50 cake gives $80, which is only a 37.5% margin. To keep a 60% margin, divide the cost by 0.40 instead: $125. This calculator always works in margin.