Anyone still working in the corporate world??

You’re not the only one!!! I also work in IT – as a systems analyst (seems the IT/cake combo is not as strange as a lot of people suggest). The job pays the bills but the cakes are my passion.

I work in IT at a space center. I love being creative whether it’s code or cake! I would love to do cakes full time, but not ready to make the jump either.

I’m a fulltime mental health technician…so not corporate, but all the same I do a job that is not cakes and is half-way decent. My struggle is funding, currently I do cakes out of my home and only two per week, I know I could do enough business to support a full-time caking job but I don’t want my home over-run by it (well, it kind of already is,lol) So if I went full time with cakes I’d want to do it out of a store-front location…but for the most part our family lives pay check to pay check and my husband is 100% against using our home for collateral on a business loan (can’t blame him there) I have a glimmer of hope in that slowly but surely, I’ve been paying off all of our family’s debts for the last two years, it’s the last year on a killer car payment, braces are finally done for the kids,and I have a wealthy aunt who really wants to start a cake business for me (she travels a lot and sometimes ‘forgets’ i’m around though so I’m not holding my breath on that one!!) Right now, I just have to be okay with the cake stuff being ‘on hold’ until the timing is right.

I’m glad to hear there are others that I have things in common with, aside from cake! I went “public” a year ago, thanks to a modification in Michigan law that allows home baked goods, and it took off like wildfire. i am booked from April through October with weddings…EVERY weekend, and everything in between. There are literally only 2 weekends I am not booked and I prefer to keep those to myself. My biggest struggle has been “friends” who think they can wait to the last minute to book, weddings mind you, and the reality is…I just can’t do it. I have a 5 year plan in place to make my final decision…of which only 4 remain…but I have been considering going full time with this since 2005… and yes, I too struggle with funding. I am building my self confidence and my client base, so we’ll see what will happen. It’s just comforting to know that there are others like myself putting in long hours at a full-time job, and then burning the midnight oil just to do what they really love! Thanks for posting your thoughts and stories, they are all appreciated!

I have a full time job too…I work in the Marketing Department for a captive finance company. And as much as I would love to do cakes full time, I have 3 kids and paying for their education takes priority.

My dream would be to own a cake supply store w itha specialty bakery for 3D cakes…and offer classes too. Maybe someday….just not today :-)

I have a full time IT job also. I am an application developer. I have been told many times I should bake for a living but that is not even something I can consider right now. I am the bread winner in the house right now and we could not afford to lose my salary.

Right now I just do it as a hobby and I am content at the moment.

Wait IT as in information technology? Just double checking, seems to be a lot of you in the same field! :D

Jessica – yep information technology. I’m surprised myself actually – I’m forever being told that it’s a strange combo, but it’s apparently quite common!

I’m a 9-5 executive assistant (secretary) at an international marine insurance company (i.e. the companies who insure the ships to pay for the accidents and loss of life and machinery, like that Italian cruise ship fiasco!) and since my husband lost his job last year for 6 months (and stayed home with our infant daughter) then finally found a job paying almost $20K less, I am now the bread winner. I’m also a Wilton Method Instructor at my local Michaels and do the baking/decorating in the weeeeeee hours of the night as a hobby and some extra money. All of my extra curricular baking/decorating/teaching started when he lost his job so we know all about living pay check to pay check and in New Jersey we still don’t have a cottage food law so anything I do is under the radar and mainly just friends and family. Like someone else said, those are the people who wait till the last minute, want extravagant cakes that defy gravity and expect it to be a “gift”. It’s tough and we all have dreams, some are luckier than others. Maybe someday when I can pay off all our debts (which doubled while he was out of work) will be paid off, NJ will pass the cottage food laws and I can maybe find a job closer to home that still pays the bills but takes less commuting time. My family time is worth more to me and everything that takes away from that isn’t worth the gum under my shoes.

Good luck, you are not alone!

How Funny that there are so many IT/cake decorators! My husband is a IT in the USCG I’m the cake decorator.