Imagine it is 8 am on a Saturday. Your bakery is preparing for a busy day, the kitchen team is ready to start, and customers are expecting birthday cakes, celebration cakes and other freshly made products. But there is a problem.

It is 9 am in a busy cake shop. The counter team has confirmed several new orders, the kitchen is preparing cakes for collection, and a customer has just called to change a design detail. The head baker is trying to remember which cake needs extra decoration. Another team member is searching through yesterday's order slips for a flavour specification. Meanwhile, the manager wants to know which orders must be ready before lunchtime.

A customer books a custom birthday cake three weeks in advance. They pay a deposit, confirm the design and choose a collection date. Your bakery adds the order to its diary, and everyone moves on to the next customer. Then the busy days arrive.

Imagine this. It is Saturday morning, your bakery is busy, customers are arriving, and several cakes need to be collected within the next few hours. One customer calls to ask whether their birthday cake is ready. Another arrives early for a wedding cake. Meanwhile, your team is trying to work out which cake needs finishing first.

Every custom cake starts with an idea. A customer might send you an Instagram screenshot of a birthday cake, describe a wedding cake they have been dreaming about, or ask you to recreate a design they saw on Pinterest.

Running a bakery is about more than baking great cakes. Every day, you may need to respond to customer enquiries, confirm cake designs, calculate prices, collect deposits, prepare orders and make sure everything is ready for collection on time.