Okay, so we're working on a smaller budget and can't decide if we should do one giant fancy tierd cake, or a tiny 2 tiered cake that only feeds a few people so that we have something pretty to cut for photos, and then have a dessert bar of things like pasteries, mini desserts, candy, etc.
I spoke to a baker in my area and she said she would do our cake for $300, which would feed about 150 people (Our guest list is 190, so this gives room for those who won't eat cake so we don't have a whole tier left over). If we did a dessert bar, we'd get all of the premade things from Sams Club and whatnot, and then probably make some of the things ourselves.
Spending $300 on a cake that a lot of people might not eat is a bit crazy, but I'm worried that the little expenses of a dessert bar when you add up ingredients, foils, stands, toothpicks, mistakes, etc will procceed $300. What do you ladies think? The reception is in a hotel ballroom on a Sunday afternoon.