Why do Wedding Cakes cost more?
Our top reasons why your wedding cake costs more than a party cake
Why are wedding cakes more expensive than party cakes? This is an interesting question and a more complex answer than you’d think. You’re not just paying for the cost of ingredients, there is far more to it…..
Admin
Wedding cakes involve far more admin than a standard party cake. Most couples reach out months (or even years!) in advance, and there’s usually a long thread of messages discussing design ideas, sizes, flavours, budgets, tweaks, questions, and updates.
Our current record for correspondence on a single wedding cake is 64 emails — with around half of those written by us. If each message takes just five minutes to read, process, and reply to, that’s over 2.5 hours of admin time before a single ingredient is even purchased. When you think about what you’d charge for a few hours of your professional time, it’s easy to see how this adds up.
Then there’s the payment admin. Wedding cakes are typically paid in two instalments — a deposit, followed by a later balance. This often involves reminders, payment checks, updating our booking system, and confirming everything is correct. It’s only a small amount of time per couple, but across a year it adds up to over 36 hours of extra admin.
All of this is part of delivering a smooth, stress-free experience — but it’s one of the many hidden costs that makes wedding cakes more expensive than party cakes.
Structure
90% of our wedding cakes are three tiers or more.
Each cake requires 4 boards, a central dowel which we handmake, and between 12 and 18 smaller structural dowels. Far more than a party cake!
- 6″ hardboard = £1.10
- 8″ hardboard = £1.30
- 10″ hardboard = £1.80
- 14″ drum Board = £3.80
- Ribbons = £2.00
- Dowels = £5.00
- Central Dowel = £2.00
- TOTAL = £17 before we even think about the cake!
Quality
Wedding cakes are crafted to a much higher standard than a typical party cake — both in the ingredients we use and the materials required to build them.
We use premium fondant to achieve a smooth, professional finish that photographs beautifully and holds up throughout a long wedding day. These higher-quality products simply cost more, but they make a noticeable difference in appearance and stability.
Wedding cakes also require thicker cake boards, stronger internal supports, and higher-grade decorations to ensure they stay secure during transport, set-up, and display.
And if you choose a fondant-covered wedding cake, it will first be coated in a layer of ganache. This gives the cake a firm, flawless structure — essential for sharp edges and crisp finishes — but it takes significantly more time, skill, and ingredients than the buttercream finish used on most party cakes.
All these upgrades contribute to the refined, luxury look that couples expect from their wedding cake.
Ingredients
We often hear, “But it’s only butter, sugar, eggs and flour!” And while you’re certainly not paying for caviar, the reality is that core baking ingredients have risen sharply in price over the last few years — especially butter, cocoa and sugar. When you’re making large, multi-tiered cakes, that increase adds up very quickly.
Most wedding cakes also use premium flavours and fillings. Couples rarely choose simple vanilla for all tiers — they opt for things like raspberry, champagne, lemon, chocolate truffle, or other flavour combinations that require high-quality ingredients. These cost far more than a standard party-cake recipe.
And it’s not just about buying the ingredients. It’s about the time, preparation, equipment, and skill needed to make each component perfectly — curds, coulis, premium buttercreams, silky ganache, or alcohol-infused syrups. These elements add depth and luxury to a wedding cake, but they also add to the cost.
Wedding cakes aren’t just bigger — they’re built from better ingredients, prepared with more care, and crafted to a much higher standard.
Quantity
Many couples don’t realise just how many portions they’re actually getting with a wedding cake. At its core, a wedding cake is dessert for all your guests — not just a decorative centrepiece.
Think about it this way:
Walk into any supermarket or coffee shop (Costa, Starbucks, etc.) and check the price of a single cake slice or muffin. A basic, mass-produced muffin can easily cost £3.80. Multiply that by 100 guests, and you’ve already spent £380 — and that’s for something made in a factory, not handcrafted.
Now imagine taking your friends and family to a nice restaurant where each dessert is freshly made, beautifully presented, and made with premium ingredients. Would you expect to pay around £5.75 per dessert? Multiply that by 100 guests and suddenly you’re at £575.
When you look at it this way, the cost of a wedding cake starts to make perfect sense. You’re not just buying a cake — you’re providing an elegant, handmade dessert for everyone you love.
Skill and Knowledge
It may look effortless when you see the final product, but achieving a flawless wedding cake takes years of practice. Covering cakes smoothly, stacking them securely, getting crisp sharp edges, and finishing them to a professional standard is far from easy.
Some bakers do cut corners — leaving boards uncovered, using minimal decorations, settling for rounded or uneven edges, or creating designs that look rushed or bumpy. Once you start noticing the details, you’ll see just how much variation there is in quality.
Wedding cakes require a huge range of techniques, textures, and finishes, many of which can’t be achieved with basic tools or beginner-level experience. New trends and methods emerge all the time, and staying on top of them takes continuous learning, creativity, and dedication.
You’re not just paying for the cake — you’re paying for the expertise behind it, the refined skill set, and the countless hours of practice that make your cake look perfect on your big day.
Cake Additions
Very few wedding cakes are left plain. Most feature beautiful additions such as fresh flowers, sugar flowers, textured finishes, toppers, edible prints, or intricate piping. These decorative elements are what make your cake unique, but they also add to the time and cost involved.
Sugar flowers, for example, are incredibly labour-intensive. A single large rose can take around an hour to make. If you want ten roses, that’s ten hours of skilled work before we even start arranging them on the cake. Unlike fresh flowers, sugar flowers are handmade, food-safe, and fully edible — but they require specialist tools and lots of experience.
Textural designs can be just as time-consuming. Take ruffle cakes: every individual ruffle is hand-cut, shaped, and applied one by one. A 10″ tier can have around 400 ruffles and take 3+ hours to complete — just for one tier.
These decorations turn your cake into a showpiece, but they require patience, precision, and artistry, all of which play a big role in the overall cost.
Time
One of the biggest differences between a party cake and a wedding cake is simply time. From baking and filling to ganaching, decorating, adding details, stacking, dowelling, and finishing — a wedding cake can take many hours, and some designs take well over a full day to complete.
This isn’t a quick job. It’s a skilled service requiring focus, patience, and years of experience.
Think of it this way:
A locksmith can charge £60 an hour to pick a lock in under ten minutes — not because the job took long, but because you’re paying for their expertise.
So when we spend hours (or even a whole day) creating a beautifully finished, structurally sound, edible piece of art for your wedding, it’s only fair that our time, skill, and craftsmanship are valued the same way.
Delivery
Let’s be honest — no couple wants to collect their wedding cake on the morning of their big day. And we wouldn’t expect you to.
Wedding cakes need to be transported and handled by professionals. They’re delicate, heavy, and often require specific tools and techniques to move safely. Many designs also need to be assembled or decorated on-site, which adds even more time and care to the process.
We charge a delivery fee because it genuinely reflects the resources involved:
- Time spent away from the shop
- Petrol and vehicle costs
- Specialist equipment for safe transport
- The expertise needed to set up your cake perfectly at the venue
Every hour we’re on the road is an hour we’re unable to bake, decorate, or assist other customers, so delivery is very much a professional service in its own right.
For more details, you can visit our Cake Information & FAQ page or drop us a message. We’re always happy to help.
Wedding cakes cost more because they take extra time, skill, quality ingredients, structure, admin, delivery and careful planning to create something truly special for your big day.
We’re always happy to work with you to create a beautiful, photo-worthy cake that fits your budget — we just ask that expectations are realistic and reflect the true value of the work involved.
If you’d like a quote, please get in touch! We’re more than happy to offer free advice, guidance, and design suggestions to help bring your dream wedding cake to life.
