Wedding cake prices
The average wedding cake in the UK made by a professional wedding cake designer costs around £500. If you include DIY wedding cakes, where family or friends have made the cake the average price of a wedding cake is a much lower figure.
The cost of a wedding cake is not just a few eggs, some flour and sugar. The cost of a wedding cake depends on a variety of factors.
- The number of tiers and the size of the tiers
- The number of the guests
- The cake designs
- The cake flavours
- Additional decoration
- Delivery and venue location
- Time is taken to create the cake
- Utility costs, electricity, water and gas
- Equipment and cake stands
The starting point for pricing the cake is the number of guests attending the wedding. Some cake makers price their cakes by the slice. If the cake is to serve 100 guests, the cake will need to serve 100 slices and if the cake maker charges £4 per slice the baseline cost for the cake will be £400. Other cake makers price their cakes by the number of tiers and the size of the tiers.
The cost of the ingredients plus the cost of production, including gas, electricity and water is taken into account when pricing the cake.
The time involved in baking the cake and decorating it is where much of the cost comes from. It takes many hours of work to create a beautiful cake.
Once the baseline cost of the cake has been established the price for the cake may increase depending on the decoration on the cake. An all-buttercream finished cake with little decoration will take less time to create than a fondant-covered cake with intricate details and decoration.
Hand-made sugar flowers are very time-consuming to make, and the type of icing used to create these is very expensive, it is a specialist product that needs to be initially flexible and then dry hard so the flowers hold their shape. If the wedding cake design incorporates many sugar flowers this will be reflected in the price of the cake. Many couples choose to have artificial flowers on their cake. Whilst good quality artificial flowers are expensive, they are ready-made and maybe a slightly cheaper option than handmade sugar flowers.
Cake toppers are an additional cost, a simple Mr & Mrs topper is not expensive, but some couples prefer a personalised topper, and these add to the overall cost of the cake.
The cake flavour will have a bearing on the price. Rich fruit cakes are the most expensive to make. The cost of dried fruits, raisins, currants etc is very high. Chocolate sponges are again more expensive than vanilla or lemon sponge. The cost of top-quality Belgian chocolate callets continues to rise. Many couples choose to have a different flavour for each tier. The most popular cake flavours are vanilla sponge, chocolate sponge, lemon sponge and red velvet sponge.
The cake consultation is another factor taken into account when pricing a cake. The couple can discuss their cake preferences with the cake designer in person and try some cake samples. This usually takes about and hour. The cake maker will then follow up with an email detailing what was discussed at the meeting. This, and any further communication all takes time and is again factored into the cost of the cake.
Equipment. Cake makers and decorators spend thousands of pounds on equipment to enable them to make amazing cakes.
Packaging. Each cake is on a cake board, there are dowels inside the cake to enable the cakes to be safely stacked and the cake needs to be securely boxed for transportation. These all add to the cost of the cake.
Delivery costs vary depending on where the cake is to be delivered. Local venues don’t cost as much in time to get there and back, and fuel costs. Venues further away will take more time and fuel and therefore this will be reflected in the price.
