SA bakery Sugar and Spice Cakes details struggle to get by with rise in costs

A popular SA cake maker has detailed its daily struggle to make ends meet – putting their business “baby” ahead of their own babies – after the shock liquidation of a fellow bakery.

An acclaimed cake maker has come out in solidarity with Heidelberg Cakes – which went into liquidation this week – saying it is forced to cut prices daily as it feels the pinch of rising costs.

Stepney-based Heidelberg Cakes was abruptly shut down on Wednesday, with about 15 employees now out of a job and up to 200 wedding orders over the next six-to-eight months still outstanding.

Another well-known cake business, Sugar and Spice Cakes, expressed sympathy in a social media post, detailing the various struggles that small businesses are facing after COVID-19 amid rising labour and rent costs.

“Daily we are asked to discount our prices and asked why we charge so much for something that is just a ‘simple’ cake,” the business said.

Amanda Forth-Piper from Sugar and Spice Cakes. Picture: File

“We pay our staff before ourselves, we are not ‘rich’ because we own a business. We have sacrificed years, put our business ‘babies’ ahead of our own & stayed standing because it’s not about the money.”

The 25-year-old Millswood business, which earlier this year was named best cake maker in South Australia by Advertiser readers, says the customer relationships they have built over the years are what keep them going.

“Keep old fashioned family businesses alive, keep old fashioned service alive otherwise we will all be packing our own bags, bowing to the monopoly of big guys and the person doing your transaction won’t remember your kids names,” the post said.

Earlier this year, another Adelaide bakery revealed the cost of staple ingredients was continuing to burn a hole in the pocket of SA bakeries as prices of olive oil and chocolate soared.

Prove Patisserie at Stepney said that with olive oil prices skyrocketing earlier this year, chocolate had become the latest ingredient to have its price hiked due to global shortages.

Skye Baillie from Skysies Cakes in Gawler, says the shortage of eggs at supermarkets has become a serious problem.

“Coles or Woolies only allows you to purchase two cartons of eggs,” she said.

“When our wholesalers are out of stock, we don’t have a backup option.”

Ms Baillie said a lot of their cake quotes are based on estimations, and don’t always account for how much labour is put in.

“It’s very hard to be able to tell with cakes because you don’t know how long it’s going to take,” Ms Baillie said.

“We’ve done cakes recently where I might have allowed a two-hour window for that type of cake to be finished, and then it’s taken us four hours, we’re completely at a loss”.