My Time Is Not Free (Even When It's Cake)

When I first started Kabsykreations, I priced like my time was free. I'd quote an order, do the math on the ingredients, and quietly absorb everything else … the hours, the back-and-forth messages, the second batch when the first one didn't set right. Somewhere in there I told myself I was "building," so it was fine.

It wasn't fine. I was just undercharging with extra steps. 😂

Here's what I'm learning: underpricing doesn't build a business. It builds burnout. And for a while, I was basically paying people to let me work for them … spending my evenings on orders that cost me more in time and energy than they ever paid back.

The hard part was that saying yes felt like generosity and saying no felt like fear. What if they went to someone else? What if nobody else ordered? So I said yes to everything, charged too little for most of it, and ran on fumes.

But capacity is real, and mine is limited. I'm a mom of three before I'm a baker. Every hour I spend on an order that doesn't respect my price is an hour I'm not spending on the things that actually move my business forward or on my kids, or on rest.

So I'm learning to treat pricing like a boundary. A fair price says: I take my work seriously, and I take my time seriously. It doesn't have to be apologetic. It doesn't need five paragraphs of explanation. My price is my price, and the people who value the work will meet it.

I've also started paying attention to the cost I can't put on a quote … the mental space. Quoting too low doesn't just hurt the bank account; it sits in the back of your mind while you're working, making everything feel a little heavier. There's a difference between working hard and working resentful. A fair price keeps me on the right side of that line.

I'm still practicing this. Every time I quote confidently instead of shrinking the number, it feels a little brave. But you know what? The right customers don't argue with a fair price. They just pay it !! and enjoy the cake.

Entrepreneurs, what was the first boundary you had to set in your business? I'm collecting courage stories.