Business cakes to order. Real review. How to make delicious cakes to order - baking master class, starting your business from scratch

If you have a small start-up capital and are looking for a type of activity to start a business, pay attention to the production of cakes. In this business you can get by with minimal investments, because... there is no need to rent premises and high costs for equipment and materials. You can successfully bake cakes at home. With an average volume of production, the business emphasis should be placed on holiday and gift items to obtain a small but stable income.

On average, such a cake costs about 1,800 rubles. If these are multi-tiered wedding compositions, then they are correspondingly more expensive.

Do not forget that before investing any amounts in production, you must:

• consider a standard business plan;
• work out a complete list of costs;
• study market prices and the needs of the population.

Promotional events for selling cakes

Baking cakes at home as a business must necessarily include successful advertising strategies to attract customers.

• Using the Internet. A good and fast way to disseminate information is the World Wide Web, the main communication portal of our time:
  • advertisement and service sites;
  • social media;
  • contextual advertising.
• Marketing ploy “cake as a gift”. If your friends are planning an entertainment event, in addition to the immediate gift, bake them a nice birthday cake. This is one of the best methods of self-promotion that includes cake business. As the saying goes: “It’s better to see and try once than to hear a hundred times.” So that guests do not forget to order a delicious cake afterwards, hand out business cards with details to everyone without delay.
• Assortment catalogues. High-quality color photographs can be posted for Internet advertising, and printed booklets can be distributed among friends and shown to interested clients.

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Financial plan for cake production

If you have already decided that the destiny of your business is the production of cakes, a business plan typical for this type of activity shows that the percentage of profitability in production is not lower than 25%.

The cost of production of one unit of production ranges from 1000-1100 rubles.

To quickly promote production, you need to make a small markup and keep prices at a lower level (15% lower) than those of competing manufacturers. According to estimates, the first year’s expenses in rubles will be approximately 200 thousand:

• products and packaging - 184 thousand;
• stickers and accessories - 3 thousand;
• business cards and flyers - 1 thousand;
• advertising campaigns - 2 thousand.

* The calculations use average data for Russia

30,000₽

Starting investments

200 - 300%

Markup on goods

1 month

Payback period

From 10,000 rub.

Baking cakes to order is a great business idea for mothers on maternity leave, as well as anyone who loves to cook beautifully and deliciously. In this article, we decided to answer the basic questions of beginning cake makers and give them an incentive to action.

There are many attractive aspects to baking custom cakes. Firstly, cake is an indispensable attribute of birthdays, anniversaries and weddings, the off-season hero of any holiday or celebration. Secondly, baking cakes can be organized even in your own kitchen, since most housewives already have everything necessary for baking. Thirdly, baking cakes is creativity, and creativity helps us express ourselves, develop, and finally feel needed by society, giving something of ourselves to others and receiving something in return. We won’t reveal the big truth, but the only thing that is required of you in order to start your own cake business is to correctly channel your culinary passion and creative drive in the right direction.

Equipment. Inspecting the kitchen

Let's start with the equipment. If you are not a stranger to the kitchen, then you can breathe a sigh of relief. You already have everything (or almost everything) for baking cakes. You can, of course, be tempted by professional units and spend a lot of money on some kind of pastry oven, or you can just look at the kitchen shelves and see what’s on them.

For example, you already have a stove and an oven, and among the kitchen utensils you will probably find bowls for kneading dough, a mixer, pots, knives, etc. Most likely, you will only have to buy specific things - molds, irons, tools for mastic, dyes. Don't forget that you can save on almost everything. For example, you can buy used molds from grandmothers in secondary markets, and in exchange for tools for working with mastic, a children's plasticine modeling set and even a manicure set are perfect. To ensure that you don’t forget anything, we provide a complete (but not strictly mandatory) list of inventory with approximate prices..

Cake baking equipment*

* prices for relevant products are taken from online stores, data is current as of October 2017

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As you can see, even in the complete absence of all this, you can easily meet 30 thousand rubles. If funds allow, you can somewhat automate the process by purchasing, for example, a dough mixer or food processor, but then the investment may increase two to three times. Much of the list can be purchased in hardware stores, china shops or large supermarkets, and for equipment for working with mastic, you can look at specialized stores for home baking lovers or order everything through AliExpress and online confectionery stores. We think there is no need to explain how to find such stores - Google will help you. As for the ingredients, everything that has a long shelf life (flour, sugar, etc.) is best purchased in bulk at wholesale stores. It is better to purchase perishable products directly to order.

Mastery. How to become a baker “from God”

Your first task is to learn how to cook cakes well and tasty. If earlier confectionery recipes could be passed down from generation to generation, but everyone could not find out the sweet secrets, today this knowledge is publicly available. Confectionery art is taught both in schools and in individual lessons. Group course offerings usually start at RUB 1,500. per person, individual ones cost 3-4 times more. For those who dream of attending master classes from professionals, but cannot afford a live presence, there are online confectionery schools. Interestingly, today, students in remote courses are no longer asked to be simply passive observers. Mentors give them homework, take tests, and answer questions. There are also disadvantages. We must not forget that for such teachers, master classes are, of course, a business. Therefore, there is a risk that you will sign up for some basic course for 6 thousand rubles, but then they will convince you that it would be stupid to miss the last opportunity to attend the best and most in-depth confectionery course for only 60 thousand rubles.

The cheapest and easiest option is to go online and start learning everything yourself, because the necessary information is in the public domain. Read a recipe or watch a video and repeat after someone who has already succeeded... What could be easier? There are several excellent confectionery channels on video hosting sites like YouTube, where they teach you how to prepare cakes step by step and at a fairly high level. Even by watching a couple of videos a day, but doing it constantly, you can gradually answer many of the questions that arose at the beginning. Some of the most popular video channels on this topic are “I am a TORtomaker” by Victoria Igamberdieva, “Secrets of Cooking”, Swetlana L.k., “Tonin Cakes”, Cakes StepByStep. You can also get inspired by an example or ask about cooking experience from simple maternity mothers who have achieved success and turned their hobby into a mini-business. You can also find useful information: on the website russianfood.com (more than 3200 cake recipes), eda.ru (almost 1000 cake recipes), 1000.menu (about 850 recipes), kuharka.ru (almost 600 tips and recipes for decorating cakes, desserts and baked goods), lovelytutorials.com (a collection of master classes from various pastry chefs on decorating cakes), foto-receptik.ru (275 recipes for mastic cakes), povarenok.ru (75 recipes for mastic cakes).

In other words, for those people who really want to learn something, there is no shortage of information. All bakers “from God” were once mere mortals. You can master all the intricacies of baking cakes for free and on your own only if you have the desire and ability to self-organize. It’s best if you conduct your first experiments on your own family, taking your time and honing your skills step by step. Don’t rush to sell right away without really learning anything. So that later you don’t blush in front of people and discourage yourself from moving on. Break more wood, but let no one except your closest people know about it. Oh yes, don't forget to take pictures of successful attempts. They will be useful for your portfolio.

Cost price. How to calculate the price of a cake

To bake to order, you do not have to draw up a business plan according to generally accepted canons and standards. It will be enough to learn how to calculate the cost of cakes and set a markup that will allow you to make the desired profit. In simple terms, the cost of a cake is the cost of all its ingredients + the price of packaging and other consumables. To calculate the cost, you will need to know the quantity of ingredients. The inconvenience is that you will need to convert many ingredients from teaspoons, tablespoons and cut glasses to grams and kilograms. To make calculations easier, keep conversion tables like this one nearby:

There are a lot of similar tables on the Internet; translation into weight measures can be found for any product. An easier option is to purchase a kitchen scale. The only thing is, if you are weighing something that cannot be weighed without a utensil, do not forget to subtract the weight of the utensil itself from the resulting figure. Please also note that the weight of the finished cake will always differ from the weight of its ingredients, as shrinkage occurs during baking.

What markup should you put on your cakes? Experienced cake makers advise you to safely multiply the cost by 2-3 times (200-300% markup). That is, if the cost of a conventional cake is 1000 rubles, then the price of 2000-3000 rubles is normal. Remember that the cake includes not only the ingredients, but also the light, gas, water spent on its preparation, and most importantly, your time and your labor, which should also be rewarded. The second criterion when setting the price is the price list of competitors. The price should not be higher than that of other cake makers.

How to calculate profit? Which one do you want? 30 thousand rubles a month? Then you need to sell 15 conditional cakes with a cost of 1000 rubles at a price of 3000 rubles. 50 thousand rubles? Then you need to sell exactly the same 25 cakes. This is elementary mathematics, elementary school. Of course, all cakes will be of different sizes, weights, and costs, but sketching out a rough plan is not difficult. As a rule, cakes weighing over 2 kg are most often ordered from private traders. You can’t earn much by producing cakes and mini-cakes.

Competition. What cake to surprise the sophisticated

“The Brownies.” They “sit at home in their kitchen and try to bake to order.”... “They don’t have a health certificate, they don’t have special equipment.” This is “the absence of any control over the production process”... Some seasoned confectioners, whose interviews can be found on the Internet, can demotivate you with their words. But try to react less to them. Despite the huge competition, anyone can stand out with their confectionery products and make money from it. Even someone who is not very knowledgeable about public catering, does not know SanPiN standards and does not have a chain of confectionery shops behind him. To figure out how to stand out, you need to do two things. The first thing is to see what offers are available in your city. Secondly, see what offers are not yet available in your city. It’s worth paying attention not to the assortment of large confectionery shops (although knowing their cakes and prices won’t hurt either), but to what private traders offer. The best way to search is through social networks. A simple search with the word “cakes” and the name of your city will give a lot of food for thought. For example, the request “Moscow cakes” on the social network “Vkontakte” produces 1838 responses, “Krasnodar cakes” - 414 responses, and even “Pyatigorsk cakes” - 34.

Ready ideas for your business

But do not rush to despair of such beating! Surely half of these groups are dead. Their number is well illustrated by the number of failed attempts to start a business. Look at the quality offered by the largest and most active groups: this is what you should strive for. Here you can also look at techniques for doing business on social networks, but more on that later. Please note that no one offers regular Napoleons and sour cream to order anymore. Most often these are all kinds of children's and wedding cakes: romantic and funny, bright and stylish. A huge number of stories. Someone makes chocolate portraits, someone sculpts confectionery trees, someone produces edible Disney cartoons...

No matter how sad it is for you, all the cake ideas have already been invented. On the one hand, this is good - there are many examples for inspiration. Here, by the way, is a good selection with 300 ideas for decorating cakes from the “1000 Ideas” portal. On the other hand, you won’t be able to invent anything radically new. If you don't believe me, try this experiment. Go to any Internet search engine in the pictures section. Type the phrase “cake in the form of...” and then substitute any words that come to your mind: “piano”, “iron”, “elephant” and so on. Whatever request you make, someone has already come up with all the cakes. Moreover, the peculiarities of the cake business are such that the main creative inventor is sometimes the client himself, sending you a photo of some cake in the form of a cap or a pink laptop with a request to bake exactly the same one and no other. Here we are gradually approaching the fact that the idea itself does not in any way guarantee you 100% success without a lack of skill, a willingness to take on any order and, of course, without the right approach to promotion.

Promotion. How to advertise yourself for free

After you get your hands on making cakes for your family, start switching to acquaintances and friends. Surely by this time your portfolio will have recipes and photographs that you are not ashamed to show. Be sure to create a group or page on VKontakte, Odnoklassniki and Instagram and try to fill them out regularly, keep active, invite friends. You can publish not only your own photo reports, but also photos of cakes from other masters and inspiring ideas. Try to keep your communities not too banal - people like a lively approach, live emotions, and observation of the process. Remember that the main thing is your customers, so set telephone notifications for incoming messages, try to respond to orders as quickly as possible. Over time, you will realize that social media can be your launching pad for much more. Many cake makers, through social networks, are starting to gather an audience for their own master classes, holding promotions with free tastings, posting educational videos, and holding competitions with reposts. Remember that in the name of your accounts you must use the word “cakes”, “custom cakes” and so on so that you are sure to be found during searches.

Pay increased attention to your Instagram page. Up to 80% of your customers will likely come from there. Food photography is one of the most common types of blogging on this social network. Learn the basic principles of food photography. Consider examples of the best Instagram accounts about confectionery art. As a rule, food photos with a natural light source are successful. In the light of lamps, any food looks plastic and unattractive. The composition of the frame, angle, and background are also very important. Here's a good article on how to properly sell food on Instagram, which can give you some useful ideas. Also, take a good look at tips for designing Instagram profiles - a lot of articles have been written on this topic.

Ready ideas for your business

Many cake makers decide that the most important thing at the beginning is to create their own website. And it is desirable that the site design looks richer and more expensive. But you need to take this step only after carefully considering the consequences. Otherwise, there is a risk of getting what the majority gets - a lot of wasted money, a crooked page that is bypassed by Yandex and Google (and therefore not seen by your clients), periodic blocking and a whole set of technical problems hitherto unfamiliar to you. that distract you from your main activity.

Secondly, in human psychology, a website is more than just a set of pictures. This is your official representation, a kind of administration, from which the demand is increased. As a rule, a website is launched by those stores that have already found their own identity and stand out from their competitors in some way, and have well-functioning mechanisms for interacting with the client. Now imagine that instead of the image of a pastry shop with hundreds of exquisite cakes and a designer interior style, the customer will come to your home for an order and see stained old wallpaper and you pulling a cake from the balcony in slippers. It is unlikely that his expectations will be met.

If you already have something to brag about, then it’s a different matter. Then you have to create a website, which must contain a catalog of your products, current prices, an individual order form, and contacts. When you have something to be proud of, you can add elements of status,

publish the faces of satisfied clients, their wonderful reviews of their work, and so on. In the meantime, gain experience, collect photos of your creations, reviews of those who tried them, develop, but it’s better not to start a website.

Underwater rocks. You are hard, cake maker's fate

Baking cakes is not without a fly in the ointment. The most common complaint of those who started working to order is physical fatigue. Many women admit that they overestimated their strength. Fulfilling orders while simultaneously raising a child becomes a burden for them. You have to spend the whole day on your feet near the oven and stove, while taking your son or daughter to kindergarten or to classes and clubs. My legs begin to ache, my nerves begin to fray, my patience breaks down.

It also happens that demand has gone out, orders have come in, but not only is there no time to fulfill them, but it turns out that knowledge is somehow lacking. Orders are rushed through the night, and the person suddenly finds himself spending several hours leveling a cake that he could handle much faster if he just knew how. The cake maker suddenly discovers that there is no time to study, and there is not much time. The cakes come out lopsided, and the client is dissatisfied with the result. Time is generally a headache for everyone who produces cakes. For example, large cakes from 3-6 kg give more revenue, but it is better to accept orders for them in advance, because there is a risk of not meeting the deadline. And the deadline here is strict: after the holiday, no one needs the cake anymore.

Many mistakes are made when communicating with clients. For example, many cake makers forget to discuss the terms of return with the client, when the customer, having already eaten the cake, says that he did not like the cake and wants to return the money. Even if your business is not registered, you should not forget about basic hygiene: cleaning your nails, hands, teeth, and so on. Work with gloves, greet the customer with a cap or tied up hair, maintain cleanliness in the kitchen, apartment and bathrooms where the customer can enter while accepting a finished order from you. Avoid situations where pets roam freely near orders. This may scare the client away.

Ready ideas for your business

Another pitfall is scammers. Unfortunately, your activity on social networks will most likely not go unnoticed. One of the ways of divorce is this. A client comes into your group and leaves an order on your wall. While you are not online, the scammer immediately responds on your behalf in private messages to the customer - he names the price of the cake and “negotiates” the price. Details are sent to the client, he pays an advance payment, and the scammer immediately disappears. Then a dissatisfied client writes in all public pages that your community scammed him out of money, and you are a fraudster. Warn potential customers about such cases and clearly indicate who exactly they need to contact to place an order. Also, never forget to put a watermark on your photos to prevent them from being stolen.

Opening an individual entrepreneur. A little about the fears of “cake makers”

One of the debatable questions among beginning cake makers is whether or not it is worth opening your own individual entrepreneur, officially registering the business and paying taxes to the state? From a legal point of view, of course, this is necessary. But in practice, most home bakers turn a blind eye to formalities. Until a decent customer base has been developed and there is no stable sales volume, no one usually bothers with registration. For such a business in the form of a part-time job, this is unprofitable: you need to pay taxes and pay mandatory insurance premiums for yourself (in 2019 this is a one-time payment per year in the amount of 29,354 rubles). Of course, you can easily succumb to fears when reading legal advice. To the point that, for example, you can be imprisoned for five years, or, for example, fined 500 thousand rubles. But it is not so.

Why? Firstly, serious liability comes for tax evasion on a particularly large scale, and it is quite difficult to prove this. Here you need a law enforcement officer to make a test purchase for a large amount or prove that you have received large amounts of income. And secondly, excuse me for being so direct, no one needs you and your cakes. You can verify this if you open any news aggregator and see who exactly is being fined for illegal business activities under Article 171. As a rule, these are alcohol sellers, spontaneous street hawkers, or sellers of counterfeit anti-freeze from a garage. Sometimes raids are organized on embankments and parks, from where they drive away any unsightly illegal trade, flea markets, or, for example, hookah vendors who sell hookahs from the floor. In a word, trouble awaits those who either sell “opium for the people” or are simply an eyesore for the authorities.

Now imagine what will happen if the state begins a massive hunt for maternity mothers quietly selling cakes? At the same time, they are raising a pair of small, noisy creatures, preparing dinner for their husbands, and running the household. Yes, nothing less than a popular revolution, which will begin with Malakhov’s broadcasts. The only option in which you may encounter a real problem is this. Some client will really suffer from your cake, for example, get seriously poisoned and write an angry statement to the police. Then a check may come to you. And he will fine you... in the amount of 500 to 2000 rubles (administrative liability). Of course, accidents do occur, and no one is immune from them. For example, one of your competitors may send you an audit because you are stealing clients with your cakes. You can find out how such checks are carried out in practice and what you need to be prepared for.

It’s worth thinking about a more serious business if you, at a minimum, bought an additional refrigerator, hired “extra hands” and are experiencing severe cramped space, which clearly does not correspond to the level of your ambitions and income. Then you can open an individual entrepreneur, look for premises for your own retail outlet or mini-workshop, purchase new equipment, and expand the sales market. The ideal option is to combine flow production with custom production. Products can also be sold to coffee shops, cafes and supermarkets. But remember that even a tiny production will require investments of 500 thousand rubles.

This business is more likely not a business, but “self-employment”. When considering it, I would pay attention to 5 main aspects:

1. Quality problems. You need to be very careful with the raw materials! If the recipe says “animal oil”, then it must be good quality oil. After all, “animal oil” is not always “animal”. At dairy plants, other products, mainly of plant origin (coconut and palm oil at best), are added to it to reduce costs. And so in everything! At the same time, you need to understand that a strict approach to the quality of raw materials also has the other side of the coin - an increase in the cost of the finished product. It is almost impossible to balance this. From low-quality raw materials, it is difficult to make a product that will be bought a second time.

2. With home equipment, it is impossible to reach... conditionally “industrial volumes” of production, in other words, to generate decent revenue. This is what industrial equipment is for.

3. Sales is always a delicate and complex matter, and the number of “orders” will be of an “abrupt” nature, and a permanent customer base will be created over the years. Therefore... maybe it makes sense to add something else with meat elements to the sweet? Scientifically, this is called “diversifying the range.”

4. When designing this business, special attention should be paid to the problems of “transportation” of finished products. Sometimes it's costly, sometimes it's not.

5. And lastly, the so-called “illegal entrepreneurship”. In general, it is advisable to do everything to avoid falling under the “radar of the state,” but, alas, this is impossible. It must be borne in mind that such activities are of little interest to the fiscal authorities and are difficult to prove, but... one must always be on the alert. It is necessary to consult with a lawyer in advance on exactly how to answer questions if the situation turns out to be unfavorable. If our state were a little smarter, in its legislative part and not only, such a problem would not have arisen. In the meantime, we have... Everything for friends, for the rest - the law!

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It's no secret that the most important decoration of any celebration is a delicious, fragrant, very beautiful, unusually decorated cake. It always delights guests and adds a special atmosphere to any celebration. Lately, people have not been turning to bakeries to order baked goods. They are trying to directly contact some pastry chef who can prepare sweets for the celebration at home. After all, a cake prepared at home always turns out more delicious and beautiful. Anyone with a desire and culinary knowledge can start such a business. In this article we will tell you in detail where to start making cakes at home so that it brings high income. Let us immediately note that only purposeful, attentive and creative people who know how and love to cook sweets can achieve great success in the business of making cakes at home.

Features of the cake manufacturing business

Getting started making custom cakes at home is very easy. At the initial stages, those wishing to build a “sweet business” will not even need to register their business activities. It will be possible to deal with the issue of registering a private enterprise for the production of custom cakes only when an extensive customer base has been formed. You can register an emergency for making cakes at home with the tax office. But in the first stages of developing your business, we recommend that you first pay attention to other issues, namely:

1. Take culinary courses specializing in “Confectionery Art”, attend several master classes from famous chefs who devoted most of their lives to making cakes with their own hands. They will not only show you different techniques for making cakes and creams, but will also instruct you. Even while you're at it and become a sought-after home-based cake maker, don't stop learning as the art of pastry is evolving rapidly. To do this, it is not necessary to spend money on purchasing books and culinary magazines, although this is welcome; you can find many different instructive and informative videos of cake production on the Internet;
2. Create a portfolio of your pastry work so potential clients can see how you can prepare and decorate a birthday cake. It is advisable to have many photographs of different options for sweets for a children's party, wedding, birthday, anniversary, and so on. The absence of this material will alarm potential clients and cause them to doubt that you are a qualified and experienced craftsman in making custom cakes;
3. Be sure to create several work pages for yourself on different social networks that will advertise your work to a huge number of Internet users. In addition, it is recommended to order a working bright personal website on which you can publish relevant information for your clients;
4. Another very important point where you need to start making cakes is to study the market. The fact is that baking production has become the most popular over the past few years. There may be several pastry chefs in your city who offer their services to people. It is advisable for you to study what their cakes taste like, what they look like, and how much they cost in order to create a competitive advantage for yourself.

What could it be:

• Lower prices for sweets (by approximately 15%);
• Unique designer cake decoration;
• An interesting system of discounts and promotions for regular customers and people who place a large order at once.

Establish contacts with employees of agencies organizing celebrations. These people already have an established client base. Offer them interesting terms for cooperation so that they recommend you to their clients as a good home-made cake maker.

Confectionery production scheme

Transform your kitchen into a “kingdom of sweets.” You need to approach this issue with love - buy the necessary equipment for making cakes, various decorations and other original nuances that will charm people who come to you with an order for the first time. The kitchen should smell of fresh baked goods and the aromas of delicious coffee and tea. This room should be “saturated” with confectionery art and your soul.

These are all the basic recommendations that it is advisable to consider before starting making custom cakes at home as a business. Please note that it will take about 2-3 months for clients to appear. At first there may be only 3-4 of them per month, but in the future, when they leave reviews about your work, the number of customers will increase several times, and your income will accordingly increase significantly.

Advantages and disadvantages

Cake making as a business has many advantages:

• There is no need to make large financial investments, especially for those women who always have all the ingredients needed for baking in their home. If any money is needed, it will only be for kitchen equipment for making cakes at home, food and utilities;
• You can work without leaving home. This is an excellent option for young mothers who are forced to be on maternity leave to care for a child, and other people who, for various reasons, cannot officially work full time away from home;
• You can develop and constantly study new technologies for producing cakes, without interrupting your work and household chores. The fact is that in the modern confectionery market there are still many free niches, there are few high-level professionals who can compete, so you can, without fear, offer your confectionery products and put a good price on them;
• For a long time, making cakes at home for beginners can be done illegally (without registering your activities in the state register of private enterprises);
• A wide field of opportunities opens up for the master pastry chef to show his full creative potential. At first, you can devote all your attention only to making children's cakes in order to develop your own author's style on them, and this is very highly valued today.

As for the disadvantages of this one, it must be admitted that it has practically none. Small nuances that can cause difficulties in the process of business development include only:

• Low level of income at first;
• The need to keep the kitchen perfectly clean all the time, which will take a lot of time. Remember that you are cooking for people who should not accidentally find something inedible or life-threatening in your cakes.

Equipment

As a rule, women who want to bake custom cakes already have everything they need for work at home. If you have just fallen in love with the art of confectionery and decided to start producing cakes at home, then you need to purchase dishes and some equipment (not necessarily professional - you can buy expensive high-level equipment only when you become a successful entrepreneur). What exactly you may need:

• A food processor for kneading dough and whipping cream (it would be nice if this device came with as many attachments as possible);
• Confectionery molds for baking of different diameters and shapes;
• Trays for baking dough in the oven;
• A pastry syringe or bag with all kinds of attachments for creating beautiful patterns;
• Culinary scales and glass with measurements;
• Various bowls and pans (deep, wide);
• Wooden utensils for cutting dough (rolling pins and boards);
• Necessary tools for making mastic for cakes at home (we are talking about a silicone mat, stacks, irons);
• All kinds of knives for cutting cakes;
• Small equipment (beaters, brushes, spatulas, sieve).

Financial investments

• To purchase products (as a rule, this happens after receiving the order, so that you know how much and what you may need in the process of making the cake);
• For the purchase of consumables (you need to immediately purchase everything you need for several orders in advance, so as not to waste time on this every time a client appears);
• On the packaging material (this should be a plastic or cardboard box with a sticker containing a list of ingredients that were used in the process of making the cake);
• To pay for utilities.

But to make it easier for you to navigate the first stages of developing your entrepreneurial activity, you can use our business plan for cake production:

• It will cost approximately 185,000 rubles per month for food and packaging materials (taking into account that every day you will bake a cake, the cost of which is 600 rubles, and package it for 60 rubles);
• For business cards and various flyers with promotions that need to be ordered from a printing house for advertising - 1000 rubles;
• Accessories and decorations for cakes (stands, decorative elements) – 3000 rubles;
• Other miscellaneous expenses - 2000 rubles (this is money that may be needed for sudden needs to complete a special order).

Profit

Your profit will directly depend on the number of orders. Using an example, we will tell you how much you can earn by selling one “Honey cake” with mastic, the weight of which is 2.5 kg:

To purchase products for sponge cakes you will need:

• 5 eggs – 45 rubles;
• 3 tablespoons of honey – 50 rubles;
• 2 teaspoons of soda – 4 rubles;
• One and a half glasses of sugar – 26 rubles;
• 5 glasses of flour – 40 rubles.

That is, you need to spend 225 rubles for this entire list of ingredients.

To purchase products for sour cream for soaking the cakes, you will need to buy:

• 2 glasses of sour cream – 95 rubles;
• 2 glasses of sugar – 35 rubles.

Sour cream will cost 130 rubles.

To purchase ingredients for butter cream you need:

• 200 g butter – 60 rubles;
• 1 glass of sugar – 15 rubles;
• 150 g of condensed milk – 45 rubles.

It will cost you 120 rubles for butter cream.

To prepare mastic you need:

• Packaging of chewing marshmallows – 80 rubles;
• 300 g of powdered sugar – 120 rubles;
• 50 g butter – 20 rubles.

It will cost you only 220 rubles for mastic.

Thus, the cost of the Medovik cake will be 700 rubles. To this amount it would be correct to add another 100 rubles for all utilities spent. Total, it turns out - 800 rubles. You can sell such a cake for 1600–2000 rubles. That is, earnings from one cake will be 800–1200 rubles. Imagine making 5 of these culinary masterpieces a week. Your net income for 7 days can be 4,000–6,000 rubles, and per month – 16,000–20,000 rubles.

Options for selling finished products

Your potential buyers will be absolutely all categories of people. If you bake cakes at home illegally, then you can sell your sweets via the Internet through your personal website and social networks.

When you reach a higher level of work, that is, you register an enterprise, you will be able to enter into agreements with stores and holiday agencies to sell your confectionery products in this way.

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Product advertising

Having decided for yourself that making cakes is the best way, you need to pay attention to the issue of self-promotion. Of course, as established confectioners say, word of mouth works best. But it makes no sense to count on him at the very beginning of building a business; you will have to do the following so that people know about you and your skills:

• Place advertisements in the newspaper;
• Actively promote your services on social networks (you can create a thematic community and give away a free cake in it once a month);
• Print beautiful business cards in a printing house every 3-4 months;
• Contact the management of special sites so that information about you can also be posted on them (this is a paid service, of course);
• Regularly update your portfolio with photographs of your confectionery products on your personal website and pages on social networks.

Summarize. Since we live in a crisis and difficult time, everyone is worried about the question: “?” One of the best options is to bake cakes at home. You already know how to organize such a business, and in conclusion we would like to give you some useful tips on how to create a competitive advantage for yourself:

• Make exclusive cakes so that they are not similar to those prepared by your colleagues. Customers appreciate inventive and creative confectioners who do not repeat decorations created by someone else, but strive to create a unique design for sweet pastries;
• Strive to make your cake not so much beautiful as tasty. If at least once you sell a “defect” to the customer, then your entire career can end at one moment. Be sure to try to fulfill all the client’s wishes so that he will contact you more than once and respond positively to your work;

Do you like to bake beautifully and deliciously? Temporarily unemployed? Do you want to try your hand at starting your own business? A cake baking business is exactly the kind of activity that will bring you pleasure from work and a good income.

The maximum investment for a home business is 40,000 rubles, the payback period for the project is 4-5 months.

Homemade cakes to order are a good business idea

Do you have any doubts?

Let's figure it out:

1. No celebration is complete without a birthday cake, especially children's parties.
2. You can organize a pastry shop in your own kitchen without renting premises and equipment.
3. Baking is a creative process that brings income and aesthetic pleasure.
4. There are many ways to find clients - the Internet, acquaintances and friends, children's playrooms, wedding salons.
5. It's easy to start a business.
6. And it's also easy to close if you lose interest in it.
7. Quick payback of production, minimal investment for its launch.
8. Stable consumer demand.
9. Registration of an individual entrepreneur is not required to start working and receive income.
10. Freedom of pricing. You set the cost of the product yourself, based on its weight, design complexity, and composition.

Startup benefits

Separately, I want to highlight the main advantages of a startup - modest initial investments, the opportunity to run a business from home, and the unoccupied niche.

More details about each item.

Small investment

If you plan to start working from your own kitchen, you will only need to purchase some baking equipment. To purchase whisks, decoration products, mats for drying mastic decorations, tools for working with mastic, plungers, molds for decorations, baking paper, a turntable and some other “needs” you will spend a maximum of 30,000 rubles.

Possibility to work from home

Having your own kitchen is enough to make masterpieces, test your skills, find buyers, and prepare the first advertising samples of products.

Niche unoccupied

Baking homemade cakes attracts many mothers on maternity leave and those who are temporarily unemployed, but not everyone manages to turn their pastry hobby into a profitable business.

Take your business seriously, create advertising for yourself, channel your creativity in the right direction and success is guaranteed.

What about competition - market analysis

The confectionery market has a number of features that need to be taken into account:

• short lead time for product sales. A beginning entrepreneur needs to work to order and actively establish sales channels;
• high competition in sales of low-priced products and low competition among expensive cakes and other products. 80% of sales in confectionery stores come from sweets with a price of 180-240 rubles;
• a huge selection of Russian raw materials: berries, fruits, nuts.

Your main competitors are large industries and those who, like you, chose home-baked goods to earn money.

Analyze the market in your area of ​​the city, study the experience of competitors, find out where and how they receive orders. Offer interesting recipes, unusual design, and attractive product prices. In order to confidently compete with large confectionery shops and “house makers” like you, you need not only to attract attention, but also to retain it.

At first, you can only count on friends and colleagues. Holiday at your spouse's work? Bring an original delicious cake and orders from his work colleagues are guaranteed.

How to start a cake business - step-by-step instructions

A clear concept is the key to the success of any enterprise. Before you start selling your first product, think over an action plan, decide on the scale of the enterprise, and make a list of equipment and materials to be purchased.

Let's look at each step of starting a business: where to start and what to pay close attention to.

Step 1. Find a room

If you have a private home, have a free room or a spacious kitchen, part of which can be used as a mini-workshop for baking desserts, then you don’t need to look for anything. If the sales volume does not yet exceed one item per day, the issue of rent is irrelevant, at least until your production becomes cramped in this area.

If you are focused on a large volume of products from the start, already have clients and have start-up capital, feel free to look for premises to rent.

Rent a room in a residential area. When choosing, keep in mind that it will serve as both a confectionery shop and a store, so it needs an appropriate layout, interior and location that is convenient for customers.

Step 2. We purchase materials and equipment

Surely baking is your hobby and you already have everything you need for work. But you still have to buy some things. In particular, tools for working with mastic, a set of pans, a syringe, a blender, a mixer and various attachments.

You will also need flour, sugar, coconut flakes, candied fruits, raisins, food coloring. It is better to buy these components in advance and in large quantities to reduce production costs. But it’s better not to buy perishable products - milk, cream, butter - for future use.

Costs for purchasing equipment from scratch:

Step 3. Selecting personnel

The need for staff will arise when you develop a customer base and receive more than one order per day. For the first couples, your own hands will be enough.

If you start to expand your horizons, hire a good pastry chef who will substitute if necessary and help you increase production volumes. As the number of orders increases, your confectionery shop will need a courier to deliver sweets to customers.

When hiring a pastry chef, ask to see a medical record, give a paid trial task to make sure of the potential employee’s culinary abilities.

Step 4. Launch a business and look for clients

The success of a business depends on the quality and beauty of the products, but more on how you present yourself.

Ways to find buyers:

1. Acquaintances, relatives, friends, work colleagues. Make the most of word of mouth. It will provide the majority of customers.
2. Advertise your services on forums where young mothers communicate.
3. YouTube. Make a video about your favorite recipes, about how another masterpiece is born in your hands, talk about the composition, the naturalness of the ingredients.
4. Advertisements on trading platforms. Be sure to include several photos, indicate the price, and contact information.
5. Advertising bulletin boards on the Internet.

Step 5. Register a business

You will need to register your business once you have built up a good customer base. The most convenient form of activity for you is an individual entrepreneur. You don’t need a lot of documents to complete it.

Income is taxed according to a simplified system, that is, you will have to pay only 6% of total income without deducting expenses or 15% of net profit to the tax service. Having registered as an individual entrepreneur, register with the Social Insurance Fund and the Pension Fund.

OKVED code 10.71.2 - Production of flour confectionery products, cakes and pastries for non-durable storage.

Be prepared for an inspection to visit your rented premises. It must meet sanitary and fire safety standards.

To help a novice entrepreneur, here are some brief recommendations on the main stages of opening your own mini-confectionery shop:

How to advertise your products

Let's look at several effective ways to attract customers.

Through social networks

Post not only photos, but also videos of the cooking process. This will confirm your authorship of the photographs and clearly demonstrate your confectionery skills.

One of the “divorce” schemes: a client leaves an order on your public page. While you are not online, the scammer will answer for you, asking you to pay for the order. He will send false details to the client and, having received the money, will disappear.

Using flyers or business cards

Even if you work alone in your own kitchen, you need business cards. Give them to your customers with every order. This way you will increase your client audience.

Flyers are another effective printed form of advertising. Post them up and distribute them to your friends. Take some to the nearest supermarket, to the locker counter, to where purchases are put away, and to other places you frequent.

Through advertisements in newspapers

Place advertisements in the best-selling classified newspapers, as well as in free printed publications handed out on the streets. Advertising in them is not expensive, but it brings in more buyers.

Using your own website

Having your own website is one of the best methods of promoting your services. Post photographs, videos, descriptions of new recipes, and your thoughts on the topic of cooking and confectionery.

If you yourself do not understand how to create and promote a website, ask your friends for help or take simple training. There is plenty of information on this topic on the Internet.

Useful video from a webinar about selling cakes on how to take photos of products, how to make a portfolio, how to attract a buyer:

Useful tips for those who want to make homemade cakes to order

I will give some useful tips from those who have achieved success in this field.

The presentation of even the most delicious and spectacular dessert is spoiled by the simple cardboard or plastic box in which it is packaged. Choose interesting packaging options for your sweets.

Order a package that indicates the date of manufacture, the composition of the treat, and your contact phone number. Box design is an original way to stand out among competitors, as well as convey necessary and important information to the buyer.

The most important mistake of novice confectioners working at home is overestimating their strengths. This especially applies to mothers on maternity leave who have chosen this business as a part-time job.

Even if you are determined to turn your hobby into a profitable business and are ready to work hard alone, still find yourself an assistant who will replace you if necessary and help you quickly and efficiently fulfill orders when their number increases.

Don't limit yourself to baking birthday cakes with fondant decorations. Offer your customers cakes, cupcakes, muffins, macaroons, cheesecakes, rolls, pies, and small cakes. Focus on low-calorie and dietary recipes.

The wider your range, the larger audience you will be interested in. Make an advertisement for all types of confectionery products that you do well. Post the photo on your website or social media accounts, sign the name, composition of the products and indicate the cost.

Planning in business is the first step to success. The clearer you are about your goals, the sooner you will achieve success. A business plan is insurance against unnecessary expenses and annoying mistakes. When drawing up a plan, describe each stage of production, starting from choosing baking recipes and ending with delivery of the finished order to the client.

Planning also reflects the financial part of the work: the costs of purchasing materials and necessary equipment, advertising, packaging and expected profit.

Create a production schedule. By consulting it, you will evaluate the correctness and effectiveness of your actions.

Set clear goals for yourself, for example, earn 15,000 rubles in the first month or sell 5-6 cakes a week, and systematically move towards your goal.

Video about how a confectionery hobby grew into a profitable business:

If you know how to cook deliciously, and your confectionery creations have long been in demand among all your family and friends, then all that remains is to find out how to make cakes to order and where to start a business at home. After all, such an occupation can be mastered by any woman who wants to earn money independently for all her needs.

Of course, when reaching a wide audience and producing large volumes of finished products, you can start opening a cake store and even organize an entire network across a city or region. But for now, let’s focus only on exclusive products that one person can make at home.

Advantages

The relevance of this type of business will never disappear. After all, cakes are a product for all occasions. Throughout the year, we buy them or bake them in honor of the holidays, use them as gifts, serve them on the table when guests arrive, and just periodically spoil the children or the whole family when the mood strikes.

And in recent years, a fashion for unusual confectionery products has come to us from American culture. People want them to be exclusive, created and decorated according to their wishes, especially dedicated to some important event. This is where the fashion for making cakes to order came from.

When creating such an exclusive product, not only the skills and craftsmanship of the chef are revealed, but also his creative talents and aesthetic tastes. Here a professional can show everything he is capable of. And if you know how to bake such sweets, then you can make money from it.

The cake baking business has a number of other advantages:

• To begin with, you need the most minimal investments, and only with development and a good stable income can you switch to more professional equipment.
• It is possible to work from home, which is especially important for young mothers or people with disabilities.
• Competition in any city is at a low or medium level, since mass production of confectionery products is focused on standard recipes.
• To begin with, it is not necessary to register with the tax service.

Where to begin?

Usually, people who have the gift of cooking deliciously and beautifully on their own gradually reach the level where friends periodically place orders for certain events or holidays.

But what should a person who has just decided to open this kind of business do?

1. Start by assessing the competition in your city. Find their groups on social networks, review the advertisements. It is important for you to find out the range of products offered, the production time of cakes to order, as well as the pricing policy. It would be useful to pay attention to the advertising methods of the most popular confectioners in the region.
2. Then think about what exactly you can offer. If the level of competition is high enough, then try to stand out in some way, for example, with unique decorations, non-standard recipes, or at least low prices.
3. Create a portfolio. Every time you bake a beautiful cake, take a high-quality photo. By presenting visual evidence of your skills, you can interest customers.
4. Also take advantage of different advertising methods.

Do you need documents?

It is advisable to register a cake business accordingly. But entrepreneurs experienced in this matter do not recommend that beginners immediately go to the tax service as soon as such an idea comes to mind. First, try to see if you can do this business, develop a client base, and organize the kitchen itself properly.

If you decide to make it official, then in order to bake cakes to order, you only need to register an individual entrepreneur. To do this, submit an application in the prescribed form, a copy of your passport and identification code, as well as a receipt for payment of the state fee. This process will not take much time.

It is much more difficult to obtain permission from the sanitary-epidemiological service and Rospotrebnadzor. They must check the conditions of compliance with sanitary standards in the kitchen and the quality of the products produced.

You can download it here for free as a sample.

Room

Since we are considering making custom cakes at home, there is no need to look for a suitable building or workshop. It is quite convenient to equip your kitchen. Firstly, it must be perfectly clean. Secondly, all tools, utensils and products are arranged in a way that is comfortable for you to work with.

Another important point is that there should be enough space in the kitchen to fulfill orders. If the business becomes successful and you cannot cope with the existing influx of clients on your own, you will need to hire assistants. And then, for the convenience of work, you will have to find an appropriate large room.

Equipment for the production of cakes

What do you need to start baking custom baked goods? Most likely, you already have enough equipment and tools for this. But here is a short list for inventory:

• food processor;
• oven and stove;
• fridge;
• various baking dishes;
• pastry syringe or bag with nozzles;
• bowls;
• pots;
• rolling pin for dough, regular and shaped;
• set of tools for mastic;
• knives and string for cutting even cakes;
• mixer and whisks;
• kitchen scales, measuring cups and spoons;
• spatulas, brushes, spatulas, etc.;
• sieve for sifting flour;
• cutting boards;
• baking paper;
• turntable for decorating cakes;
• various equipment for decoration (molds, plungers, border recesses, molds);
• food coloring and markers.

Professional equipment can be purchased gradually only after you begin to fulfill large volumes of orders. To get started, all you need is the equipment you already have in your kitchen.

Staff

Whether you should hire someone to help you is a personal decision. Here, a lot depends on the influx of customers, and if you can’t cope with it, then it is advisable to use the help of specialists who have experience working with confectionery products.

But there is another side to the coin. If you start hiring employees, you will need not only registration of an individual entrepreneur, but also expansion of the kitchen space. And this will entail large financial investments in the enterprise.

Where to look for clients?

Baking cakes also involves trading in confectionery products. It’s good if you already have friends who periodically order something for themselves. Over time, they will begin to recommend you to their friends. Word of mouth is the best way to spread information in your case.

1. Create groups or pages on social networks and post photos of your work there.
2. Make a separate website so you can view your finished products, as well as place an order online or by phone.
3. Place advertisements on the Internet, in public transport or in various institutions.
4. Prepare beautiful and delicious cakes several times for free for some corporate event.
5. Agree on ongoing cooperation with small stores that sell homemade or sweets.
6. Make business cards and distribute them to everyone you know.

Cost and profitability

Since you don’t need to purchase expensive equipment, you will first only have to spend money on the products themselves for your first masterpieces. If you bake them for free for advertising purposes, then these are the costs of starting a business. But the most profitable is considered to be custom work.

Calculating the cost is quite simple. To do this, measure exactly how much and what products you used for the cake. Add to this the costs of electricity, gas and water, and don’t forget about packaging. The final amount just shows the real cost of the product. To make money on this and appreciate your efforts, it is recommended to double or even triple this amount.

But be sure to stay within limits when setting your prices. For example, if in your region there are many chefs of the same orientation, then you should not inflate prices. To become one of the popular and sought-after craftsmen in the city, it is better, on the contrary, to reduce the cost of your products. For example, to start with it could be only a 20-40% markup.

To reduce the cost of products, it is advisable to purchase some of them (involving long-term storage) at wholesale centers, warehouses, and from farmers. For example, by purchasing flour, dried fruits, sugar, cocoa and other similar ingredients in large quantities at a low price, you can significantly reduce the cost of the finished product.

The profitability of this type of business is considered quite high. And with minimal investments, after 3-4 months you can talk about net profit. If initially you already have everything you need, then from the first days you start earning only from the difference between the amount spent and the amount received.

As in any business, this business has its own troubles and difficulties, for which it is advisable to be prepared:

• You should not expect that you will earn a lot by baking cakes at home on your own. You won't be able to get rich here, especially if you don't plan large-scale expansion in the future.
• Confectioners complain of extreme fatigue. After all, this is a labor-intensive process and often women, constantly cooking to order, feel physically exhausted. Especially if, in addition to making cakes, you also have to deal with household chores and children at the same time.
• It is very important to adhere to the exact deadlines agreed with the client. After all, after the expected holiday or event, the confectionery product will no longer be needed.
• Remember that the cake is a perishable product, so you need to think carefully about how long it will take to make so that you don’t have to keep it in the refrigerator for an extra day.
• With a large influx of customers, there is a risk of not being able to complete all orders. Therefore, decide in advance what volumes you can handle and do not take more than you can cook. Or think about helpers.
• Periodically attend confectionery courses, then you will be able to spend less time on individual stages of preparation or offer your customers something original.
• Please consider the terms and conditions for returning unsuitable products in advance. After all, it also happens that a client eats the entire cake, and then asks for a refund because he didn’t like the taste.
• Don't forget about your competitors. Some of them may do unpleasant things, for example, notifying regulatory authorities about your activities or mistakes.
• Maintain perfect cleanliness in the kitchen and throughout the apartment, bathrooms, keep your hair gathered and under a hood so that customers are not put off by the unkempt appearance of the pastry chef or the dirt around. Pets are also excluded from this method of earning money.
• There are risks of encountering various types of scammers. For example, in social groups someone may answer for you and take an advance payment for an order. This will ruin the chef's reputation. Therefore, establish communication methods from the beginning to avoid any unpleasant misunderstandings.
• To eliminate possible health problems for customers, always use only high-quality and fresh products for making cakes.

Financial part

In order to determine whether it is profitable to engage in this type of business, you need to make preliminary calculations. Let's list the numbers in the table.

If you bake 20 cakes in a month and sell them for 2,000 rubles (at a cost of 1,000), then in two months you will be able to return the initial investment. But the exact figures will depend on your capabilities, customer base, competitors, established prices and order volumes.

Video: how to make money on cakes at home?