In a real way, weddings are a good exercise in prioritization, communication and compromise if the budget is fixed. How many guests (and who is on the list), how much set aside for savings, venue, food, drink, flowers, entertainment … My D is keeping a master spreadsheet. It’s been a good learning experience for her.
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I had been working full time for the past few years with the express purpose of having the money to pay for a nice reasonable wedding at some point. Then older DD fell madly in love with a young man from a family with crazy amount of money and the desire to spend it. We spent what we had intended . But the grooms family paid the rest which was about 75 percent of the total. It was a CRAZY amount. There was a 15 piece band, a DJ and a string quartet. We had a live wedding painter. We had a photo booth. The florals alone were nuts. I will say though that we did not pay for a cake. My DD and SIL were not interested in a cake. They instead had a five station desert bar (churros , lava cake, chocolate dipped fruit, ice cream sundae, warm cookies). It probably cost about what that $3000 plus cake cost.
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Would love to know what % the wedding cake business is down for weddings overall. It’s like once someone realized it was an option to NOT have a wedding cake, everyone got creative with the dessert options! (Having a wedding cake, ok. Having other desserts, ok. It’s all ok, just curious how many are opting NOT to have a tiered traditional cake).
Blame it on the cupcakes. :). When people started opting to have cupcakes instead of a large cake, all dessert hell broke loose. 
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I’m two for two in the last 5 months with no (limited) cake. Daughter who married in October had a very small cake (8"?) to cut, and then cupcakes. Same baker. I think it was $240ish for everything, including delivery (about 20 miles). Daughter who married in March had a plated dinner with a chocolate cake with raspberry sauce. Nothing to cut.
My nephew last June only had a cake because his MIL insisted. They had an ice cream bar with lots of toppings. They did cut the cake and whoever wanted some could have it. but I think half the guests didn’t even know it there or being cut. I’m sure the cake cost $500 because the MIL insisted on a bakery and not Whole Foods. (I had some; it was okay but nothing spectacular).
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D2’s multi tiered wedding cake came with the venue via the caterer.
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2012 - Big kid and her bridesmaids baked cupcakes. Little kid made a centerpiece for the cupcake tower. Everyone raved about the cupcakes. Big kid was jokingly told to start her own cupcake business! She said no thanks, she’d stick with her PhD program, because immunology is less challenging than running a retail store. 
2022 - Little kid and her now husband ordered a small 2-tiered cake for cutting in addition to the delicious desserts the caterer made. Let’s say delivery of that cake to the wedding venue was a bit challenging, but I did not fail!! 
This is how the cake traveled…. We loaded the truck and off we went, with the booze in the cabin, floral decor and dishes in the bed, and the cake in my lap.
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Looks great! Love all the ideas about Publix, cupcakes, etc.
You just have to make sure your venue doesn’t charge mandatory “plating” fees for anything you bring in. Some of the places we’ve looked at have those, and for us that would add between $1,700 and $3,000 depending on the venue because I think the administrative fee and tip are still calculated on this.
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So $3600 just for the cake and up to another $3000 for the venue to serve it? 
No wonder you are a bit shellshocked by all of this!
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I’m shell shocked but not quite as bad as what you think. If I get their cake, it’s $3,600. Actually it’s just under $5,500 because I forgot to add the administrative fees & taxes 32% plus 20% tip. OR, if I bring my own cake or anything else, then they charge you a plating fee.
I’m actually starting to chill out a little bit about this. I think the numbers are just so excessive that my D & her fiancé will get turned off too.
My D knows how upset I’ve become over food costs for families for the past 2 years or so, and how I’ve been donating to our local food pantry. To me, if we got a cake that costs so much, I’d utterly feel like Marie Antoinette.
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My niece actually forgot to order a cake at all, and realized that the days before. Mother of Groom volunteered to pick one up day of, had it decorated at the grocery store and all was well.
Sometimes there is a learning curve of what is a typical price and what is ridiculous. (And $3600 is , imho, ridiculous)
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I cannot imagine a $3600 cake. How many would it serve?
I just told D1 about the 3500 wedding cake. She said she is not surprised around NYC because kids birthday cakes are like 750.
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200
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Yikes! Costco has great kids birthday cakes.
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lol maybe in the circles she socializes! No shortage of supermarket/Costco/Brooklyn Chinese bakery cakes around here.
(OT so I will stop.)
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D1 is quite frugal and probably wouldn’t spend that much on a birthday cake, but GD1 does go to a lot of birthday parties in Brooklyn.
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Just for fun, I took a look at the bakery where I got a small delicious cake for my last milestone birthday. Based on their discussion, I can see where a cake to serve 200 could easily cost about $2000.
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For many years, Woolworth’s in Denver (downtown location) was THE place to get wedding cakes. Huge, delicious, beautiful and about $100 (in the mid 70’s-90’s).
I ate lunch at Woolworth’s often and always looked at the cakes they were making (decorated them in the front window).
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DD’s first anniversary was last weekend so we’ve been reminiscing over the wedding photos. Here’s a picture of their cake for a 90 person NYC wedding. We also had a selection of passed desserts so there were many options for sweets. The tiers were 10", 8", 6" and they saved the 4" top tier for last weekend. So not a very large cake (nor very ornate) and the cost was $1600. I can see how a cake for 200+ guests could cost thousands. We’re not from NY so I was a bit shell shocked by how much everything cost to hold the wedding there.
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Very small cake for the bride and groom to cut. They had a Venetian Table with a good variety of desserts on it (and coffee).
The teeny two layer cake was a gift from a friend who is a fabulous baker!
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