Ever since Carrie Bradshaw unwrapped a sponge topped with a dollop of frosting and tucked into it while pondering life’s big questions (like whether her LBD was crying out for the blue Manolos or the red Pradas), cupcakes have shown some serious staying power, long outliving their fleeting screentime on SATC.

Magnolia Bakery in New York was credited with being at the forefront of this worldwide cupcake wave. But should we even call it a “trend” when it’s been over two decades? And that’s not even counting the fact that here in Blighty we already had fairy cakes long before we saw Carrie scoffing one on a park bench.

Now you’ll find cupcakes everywhere across the UK – supermarkets, high street bakeries, trendy dessert spots and countless little shops (many of which have come and gone) dedicated to these small cakes in paper cases with swirly icing. A lot of the appeal was aspirational – this was an affordable treat with a side of fantasy: Carrie eats them. You may not be able to casually buy Pradas, but you could absolutely have a bite of that glossy lifestyle. They were also convenient and portable, neatly encased in their own wrapper so you could eat one on the go, perhaps while scrolling birthday cake ideas and mentally planning your next celebration cake.

Back in 2011, I remember cupcakes from London cupcake bakery chains costing around £2.20. Now, in 2023, the same bakeries charge about £3.60. That’s almost a 65% increase. Over more than a decade, it isn’t exactly shocking – ingredients, labour, electricity, even the cost of washing-up liquid have crept up. Still, it stings a little when you’re staring at a tiny swirl of icing with a big fat price tag.

But cupcakes have now hit £7.20 in some London bakeries. That’s when it starts to feel a bit “are you having a laugh?”, especially when you realise you can get a kids’ meal with a drink for less than that, eaten in, at an actual table. Or, if you’re dessert-minded, you could put that money towards a whole luxury cake to share instead of one lonely little cupcake.

Now, £7.20 and upwards is also what you’d expect to pay for a plated dessert in a restaurant, so by that logic, £7.20 for a sweet treat doesn’t sound outrageous. Except it does, because the value proposition of a dressed-up muffin in a case versus a warm sticky toffee pudding with ice cream is…unflattering, to say the least. And then there are other fancy-but-fun treats in the same “grab-and-go” vibe that cost less – doughnuts from Donutelier, for example, are beautiful, indulgent, and sit between £5–£6. Even some of our own Hero Doughnuts feel like better value when you consider the size, toppings and sheer joy-per-bite ratio.

Objectively, £7.20 may or may not be overpriced. The cost-of-living crisis hits businesses hard too – rents, bills, rates, fuel, ingredients, packaging, all of it has spiked. Some cupcakes are decorated so elaborately – with fillings of ganache or jams, piped buttercream peaks and hand-made embellishments – that it can take longer to make a batch of them than it would to bake and decorate a full layer cake. When you’ve painstakingly fiddled with fondant for an hour, the price tag starts to make more sense.

So are cupcakes now at risk of becoming unaffordable luxuries? Would you still buy one as an on-the-go treat, or does it now feel more like a once-in-a-while splurge? Were they always underpriced, or have they tipped into bad-value territory? Personally, I still think it’s always worth making your own at home – with our Hero Sponge Recipe you can whip up a whole batch of the most delicious, moist cupcakes in various flavours for under £3. That’s less than the cost of one mediocre cupcake from a high street bakery, and you get the smug satisfaction of a home-baked tray cooling on your counter.

Let me know your thoughts – would you rather one £7 cupcake, or a whole box of home-baked beauties and maybe even a little cupcake decorating session at home?

Love,
Reshmi xoxo

If all this talk of frosting and crumbs has you craving something celebratory, our hand-delivered cake delivery in London makes it wonderfully easy to skip the overpriced single cupcake and dive straight into a centrepiece worth sharing.