Is It Worth It?!

I did a charity bake sale at work couple weeks back. I baked cookies, I also asked my co-workers to donate delicious sweets to raise money.

One of the manager's wife donated a bunch of panna cotta (per my request...hahaha....she's very famous for her dessert). At the sale, I maked it $3 a piece.

Stranger 1: What's this?!

Helper 1: It's panna cotta, we have different toppings. $3 a piece.

Stranger 1: What?! $3 for such a small cup, while the cookies are $1 a piece? It's so expensive.

(Stranger 1 walked away with cookies. )

Later, Stranger 2, 3...etc all walked away with something else, commenting panna cotta is too expensive.

Helper 1: The panna cotta is not selling. Should we lower the price?

Helper 2: Yeah, $3 items on bake sale is a bit expensive, no?

Me: But it's panna cotta!! It's so pretty!! Hm....I wonder how it taste like, I can't even describe it to people. Let me try one.

(I grabbed a mango toppinged panna cotta and start digging in)

Helper 3: But then we'll have one less to sell, if you just start eating like this.

Me: Just put it on my tab! Then we won't be wasting food.

(Several bites later)

Me: Oh...this is SOOOOOO GOOOOOOD!!! It's really creamy...and the mango is a little bit tangy and sweet at the same time. Anyone wanna try it?

(The cup was passed around, and many helpers had a bit too)

Me: It's too good to mark the price lower.

Helper X: Yeah...I agree. We should have this at a higher price range. Otherwise it's not fair for this delicious and pretty dessert.

Me: Worst come to worst, we now all know that it's really good. We can just buy them ourselves and take them home.

Helper X: I'd totally buy everything.

Me: I have a feeling that you won't take it home, hahaha.....

A little bit later, some more people stopped by and started asking questions about what we have.

Stranger x: What's this? (pointing at panna cotta)

Me: Oh this is called panna cotta, it's an Italian dessert, like a cream pudding. It's very creamy and silky. We have 3 different types of toppings here: XX, YY, and mango. They are all very good.

Stranger x: Yeah, they look really pretty.

Me: Of course! They're not only pretty and delicious too. They're $3 each. They're kinda expensive, but think of it this way, these are high end dessert made from scratch. If you go to those really fancy bakeries, they'll charge you at least $5 each. Here, we only charge you $3, which is steep discount. Plus, all your money goes to charity, for a very meaningful cause. You should try it.

Stranger x: Hm....really?! Are they that expensive?

Me: Trust me. These are not cheap. Just look at the presentation, it's so nice. I just bought one myself, and I really loved it. In fact, a few of our helpers tried it, and bought some already. It's very smooth, and creamy. The topping has a nice contrast to the creamy flavor, and gives a very refreshing note.

Stranger x: You made it sound so delicious. Okay, let me try it, and see if it's as good as you described.

Me: Hey! I mean it. And I can guarantee that you'll come back and want more.

(Stranger X walked away with a mango topping panna cotta)

Before long, more people are convinced that the $3 panna cotta is a very good bargain, and started buying multiples of panna cotta.

Some of the earlier crowd came back.

Me: Did you like the panna cotta?

Stranger Y: Oh yeah....it's just as you described. Do you have more?

Me: Sorry, it's all sold out now.

Stranger Y: That fast? With a $3 price-tag?!

Me: It's really delicious, and it's still a bargain compare to the out-side bakery. Of course people will start buying as many as they can.

Stranger Y: Okay....next time then....I won't only buy one.

Me: Yeah....next time you should trust what I tell you.




(After the bake sale, the manager called me to ask how it went)

Manager: So did you sell them all?

Me: Yeah, of course. Yours were among the first to be sold out.

Manager: Yeah? How much did you charge?

Me: $3 a piece

Manager: What?! And you sold them all?!

Me: Yeah...every single one of them.

Manager: I was expecting you to tell them for like $1.50 or something like that

Me: Hehehe...we sold every single one of them for $3 each

Manager: I need to tell my wife. We can't believe you can market it for so much.

Me: It's really delicious, isn't it?! Of course it's worth more. By the way, thanks for the donation. We made more than $500 in 2 hours, and we sold every single piece we have.

Manager: No problem. Good job.



(Couple days later, I ran into the manager again)

Manager: I told my wife, and she cannot believe you charged so much and people actually bought them all either.

Me: Hahaha....you should tell her to sell it for this much should she decided to ever start her own dessert business

Manager: Yeah...now you have totally got her thinking






Is the panna cotta worth $3?!

Well, it all depends on how you look at it.

If you look at it as the regular cream pudding you find in grocery market isles, then most likely, it's not worth the $3 I charged.

On the other hand, I marketed those panna cotta as a discounted high-end dessert. I know, perfectly well, that this is probably a little bit too expensive. But with a catchy exotic name of panna cotta (Italian), it already gives off the impression of being something very special.

With the persuasion of a good sales person (i.e. Me! =p), many of the buyer truly agree that this is indeed a high-end dessert at bargain price.








p.s. For the bake sale, I actually raised $602 for American Cancer Society, thanks to everyone's generous support and donation. I'm very happy that things turned out so well. I even got people telling me that they'll totally help out for the next charity bake sale. =D