So a few weeks ago one evening on a Friday night, I was just watching a little TV when my phone rang. Clients have called me this late before so it wasn't unusual.
Hello, dog cakes for dogs can I help you?
Caller: Yes my name is Jane Doe and I am the manager of Tuna the dog, are you familiar with him?
Oh yes Tuna the Bulldog!
Caller: No Tuna the Chiweenie.
GIGGLE...
Can I help you? Even though I have gotten similar calls before, I knew what she would say next.
Caller: Well Tuna is an Instagram sensation with 1.6M followers on IG and another 500,000 on FB. His birthday is Monday.
She was very nice and I noticed her area code was out of state. She had what I describe as a slight Southern accent as I walked over to my computer to check out Mr. Tuna the dog. She was not pretentious at all as my past experiences were with these calls. I have never done a cake for a IG sensation and did not intend to. A charity or rescue yes but not for a popular dog.
Now at this point it is a little funny for a couple of reasons, one this dog has a manager, two there are two dogs that are named Tuna and I am just about to find out why they are calling me for a free cake, which is not that funny but more annoying.
Caller: We were wondering if you would be interested in making a dog cake for him in exchange for social media mentions? It doesn't have to be a fancy cake, any cake you want to make would be fine.
Well I don't think so because I would start it tomorrow and it will not be ready for Monday, thinking I was shipping out of state.
Caller: We are doing press in NYC and the party is downtown at 6PM.
So I see the dog and thought, hahahahaha. If you know what Tuna looks like he is an unusual beauty with a severe overbite. Well I happen to have a weakness for overbites and underbites in dogs and besides this dog cake would be a small challenge to design.
Sure I'll do it, I have to do a cake that looks like him though.
Caller: She was very happy.....and so was I.
I worked on the cake for 2 days carving Tuna's famous snout from one piece of cake and adding his teeth last. I delivered it to a NYC Hotel they were staying that Sunday. The party was a hit and my Instagram blew up within the next 24 hours.
It really was a pleasant experience although I'm not sure if I would do it again.
Thank you Tuna.
