Working extra for a month, office workers earn nearly 200 million

It's just a seasonal part-time job, but many office ladies are making huge profits making and selling handmade moon cakes.

Some people even made a profit of nearly 200 million VND during the Mid-Autumn Festival which only lasted for more than 1 month.

Ms. Le Ngoc Yen on Thien Quang Street (Hai Ba Trung, Hanoi) confided that, as an office worker, she spends most of her working hours at the office. Having free time in the evenings, on Saturdays and Sundays, in recent years, she has started practicing making cakes, including moon cakes, to satisfy her passion.

Ms. Yen said that at first, she often made moon cakes in the traditional style. The cakes “met the standards” in both appearance and quality, so when her friends supported her, she started making and selling them.

In the past two years, she has been experimenting with making moon cakes in the shape of cute animals, cakes with modern and creative colors with lotus flowers, chrysanthemums, etc. The fillings are also very diverse, from mixed to taro, green tea, durian, black sesame, etc. The price of the cakes ranges from 280,000-420,000 VND/set depending on the quality and design.

For example, a set of Japanese charcoal shell, gac fruit, green tea, butterfly pea flower (no food coloring) costs 280,000 VND/set of 4 cakes without eggs, with eggs 300,000 VND; a set of baked cakes shaped like flowers with Japanese charcoal shell, gac fruit, green tea, butterfly pea flower,... costs 400,000 VND/set of 4 cakes without eggs, with eggs 420,000 VND,... Customers can choose the fillings as they like, but cannot choose the color and style of the flowers. Or, a set of 6 pig-shaped cakes including 2 parents and 4 cute little pigs costs 220,000 VND/set.

According to Ms. Yen, people who like to buy her cakes mainly trust the quality. Because, the ingredients to make the cakes are mostly made by her own hands, some are custom-made and absolutely not bought at the market. She does not use food coloring but uses natural colors such as green tea, gac fruit, butterfly pea flowers, etc.

“Thanks to the new types of cakes, last Mid-Autumn Festival, customers praised my cakes for being both beautiful and delicious, and ordered a lot,” said Ms. Yen. In just one season of moon cakes (sold from the 15th day of the 7th lunar month to the 13th day of the 8th lunar month - close to the Mid-Autumn Festival), she earned over 30 million VND in profit.

However, Ms. Yen said that to earn that much profit, she had to work quite hard every evening and had no rest on weekends. At peak times, she had to hire more students to work under close supervision.

“During the Mid-Autumn Festival, there were many orders for cakes from customers. Sometimes I had to stay up all night to make them on time, but because of my passion, I forgot all the tiredness. Especially, this year, I also opened cake making classes for office ladies who have the same hobby,” Yen shared.

Also passionate about baking, for the past 5 years, Ms. Dang Thi Van in Yen Phu (Tay Ho, Hanoi) - an office worker at a foreign company on Hoang Quoc Viet Street (Cau Giay, Hanoi) - has started making cakes to earn extra money every Mid-Autumn Festival.

She said that she learned how to make moon cakes from a friend with traditional cakes, then she learned more about animal-shaped cakes, chrysanthemum cakes, lotus cakes, fish cakes,... with modern colors of green, red, purple, yellow (natural colors from gac fruit, pandan leaves, purple flowers) so customers were quite interested.

The first year, she only sold about 600 cakes, then each year she increased by 200-300 more. By the Mid-Autumn Festival of 2015, she could not count the number of cakes she sold because customers ordered so many.

Usually, she takes advantage of her free evenings to make cakes, and on weekends she works from morning to night. In addition, she has to hire 10 more students to help her make cakes in order to deliver them to customers on time.

“Although the price has not increased, always kept at 70,000-100,000 VND/piece depending on the type, but at the end of last year's cake season (only about 1 and a half months), I earned nearly 200 million VND,” Ms. Van boasted.

Ms. Van said that this year, she decided to start the cake making season early so that people could order and give the cakes as gifts. To please customers, she also ordered custom-made boxes, designed by herself, so that customers would be satisfied when giving the cakes to friends and relatives.

According to Zing