The fact pattern
Read it twice before you look at the answer
A couple emails a bakery: 'We'd like to order a three-tier wedding cake for June 14 at the price on your menu, $600.' The bakery emails back: 'Confirmed — we'll have it ready.' Three weeks later, and two weeks before the wedding, the couple emails to cancel because they found a cheaper baker. The bakery had already bought $90 of specialty ingredients and turned away another June 14 order worth $500 in profit. The bakery sues for breach.
Try it before you scroll
Spend 15 minutes writing your own IRAC answer first — the model below is far more useful after you have committed to your own issue list. These issues are in the facts:
- Offer, acceptance, and consideration (formation)
- Common law vs. UCC — is a custom cake a 'good' or a service?
- Breach by anticipatory repudiation
- Expectation damages and mitigation
Model IRAC answer
One way to write it — not the only way. Compare it to yours.
Issue
Whether a binding contract was formed for the wedding cake and, if so, what damages the bakery may recover after the couple cancelled two weeks before performance.
Rule
A contract requires an offer, acceptance, and consideration. An offer is a manifestation of willingness to enter a bargain on definite terms; acceptance is an unequivocal assent to those terms; consideration is a bargained-for exchange. A clear, unequivocal statement that a party will not perform before performance is due is an anticipatory repudiation, which is a present breach. The non-breaching party may recover expectation damages — the benefit of the bargain — reduced by costs saved and subject to a duty to mitigate avoidable losses.
Application
Formation is satisfied. The couple's email was an offer: it stated definite terms (a three-tier cake, June 14, $600). The bakery's 'Confirmed — we'll have it ready' was an unequivocal acceptance. Consideration is the bargained-for exchange of the cake for $600. (Whether the common law or UCC Article 2 governs is worth flagging — a custom cake is arguably a sale of goods — but the formation analysis is the same here, so it does not change the outcome.)
The couple's cancellation email, sent two weeks before the June 14 performance date, is a clear statement that they will not perform. That is an anticipatory repudiation and therefore a present breach; the bakery need not wait until June 14 to sue.
On damages, the bakery seeks its expectation interest: the profit it would have earned. The $500 in lost profit from the turned-away order is a strong measure if the bakery can show it could not have taken both jobs. The $90 in specialty ingredients is recoverable reliance to the extent the ingredients cannot be reused. The duty to mitigate matters: because the cancellation came two weeks out, the bakery likely could rebook the June 14 slot, which would reduce or eliminate the lost-profit claim — the couple will argue the bakery failed to mitigate.
Conclusion
A binding contract was formed and the couple breached by anticipatory repudiation. The bakery can recover its expectation damages — lost profit plus unrecoverable ingredient costs — but the award will be reduced by whatever it reasonably could have earned by rebooking the date.
Verify before you rely on this. This is an original teaching example, not legal advice. Rules vary by jurisdiction and by your professor's framing — check every rule statement against your casebook and class notes before using it.
Now try it timed.
Open the IRAC Practice Gym, set a 15-minute timer, and write your own answer to this fact pattern. You get feedback that helps you think — never an answer written for you.