How to Start a Cupcake Business – Books & Ideas to Get You Going

I love talking about unique business ideas you can run from home or just on your own terms. Perhaps one of my favorites is a CUPCAKE SHOP!

I get so many people who ask me about cupcake businesses that I felt compelled to write a post highlighting some of the best CUPCAKE BUSINESS RESOURCES I can find.

Before I would start any business, I would likely read about 5 books on the subject (not kidding!). There is absolutely no reason for anyone to have to go into business completely blind these days…there is so much information available to us now. 

I would want to know everything about getting into selling cupcakes for extra money BEFORE I jumped into the business. By just reading a few books, you can learn about a typical work day, supplies you’ll need, hours you can expect to work, operating costs, how to structure your business, creative ways to market your cupcake shop, and more.

Related Reading:

<< How to Start a Blog to Make Extra Money  |  How to Teach Kids ABout Finances >>

5 Books About the Cupcake Business

Here are 5 must-read books I found that I think could give you a good foundation for knowing the ins and outs of cupcake selling (and whether or not it’s for you!). I am a big fan of mucho research upfront for less heartache later. Six books, even if they cost $10 each, would be $50 well spent if they helped you figure out that cupcake selling is NOT for you.

I can’t imagine many more difficult things than starting a business you hate. If you seriously want to be a cupcake shop owner, I would read at least 3 of these if not all 6. You should see my office shelf – it’s full of blogging books! And I haven’t regretted a single purchase yet. It’s almost cheating to learn off of someone else’s hard work. 🙂

Just click on each image to see the book listing.

Additional Income Ideas Related to Cupcakes

I know a lot of people don’t think of this because they’re not in the online business world, but there are actually ways to earn money from cupcakes OTHER THAN simply having a cupcake shop. Here are two that come to mind:

1. Create cupcake recipes with excellent images and sell them to bloggers – I have paid $20-$30 per cupcake recipe that comes wiht 4-5 high resolution images and instructions for making the cupcakes. This is because I am not good at photography and I also don’t feel like baking cupcakes to take photos when I can just pay someone else to do it! One lady I know makes cupcakes, takes photos of them at home, sells the image packages to bloggers, and then gives the cupcakes to her daughter WHO HAS A BAKERY. They make money off those cupcakes on both ends! It’s genius if you ask me! The beauty of it is that she sells semi-exclusive rights to her recipes which means she sells different batches of photos of the same recipe for $20 each to four different bloggers. In other words, she is making $80 on every batch of cupcakes ($20 x 4 bloggers) BEFORE her daughter even sells them at the bakery. WOW. Keep in mind that you need a really nice DSLR camera and lens for this, but if you set this up properly you would make back that investment in no time.
2. Blog about cupcake recipes! I think it’s so silly yet so cool! Here I am writing about family finances and serious stuff like investing while these other smart bloggers are writing about cupcakes and the sweet delicious recipes they are testing out! Blogging is such a cool way to earn extra money – you really can blog about anything you’re passionate about and make money doing so. Cupcakes are no exception!

I think the best part about all of these cupcake business ideas is that they are stackable. Meaning, there is no reason you can’t do one or more of them together! The lady I told you about with the cupcake virtual assistant services above? She not only sells content to baking-challenged bloggers and gives them to her daughter to sell at a bakery, but she also has her own blog and reserves one batch of images for herself! I love anything you can do once and make money multiple times with. 🙂

I hope these cupcake business ideas were helpful to you. If you are interested in more ideas like this, make sure to sign up for my Money Making Ideas newsletter. And if you are interested in starting a blog, make sure you check out my detailed Blog Startup Guide.

Let me know what your cupcake business plans are in the comments! 😀