How to Take Thanksgiving Pie Orders as a Home Baker

Short answer: to take Thanksgiving pie orders from home, first check which pies your state lets you sell. Then set a short menu, a price and a firm limit based on your oven space. Close orders about a week before pickup. Take payment or a deposit when the customer orders, and give each customer a pickup time slot. Thanksgiving is Thursday, November 26, 2026, so most pickups will fall on November 24 or 25.

Every November, the messages start early. “Are you doing pies this year?” “Can I get two pumpkin and one apple?” “Can I pick up Thursday morning?” Each one is easy to answer. Forty of them, spread across Instagram, texts and Facebook, are not.

Thanksgiving pie orders are different from your normal orders. They all come due in the same two days. Many of them need a fridge. And a missed pie cannot be made up later, because the dinner is on one fixed day.

This guide gives you a plan for the whole season. It starts with the rules. Then it covers how many pies to take, how to collect orders and payments, and how to run pickup day. The steps work with a notebook, a form or an app.

1. Check which pies you can sell from home

Start here, before you post a menu. In the US, selling food from a home kitchen is covered by cottage food laws, and each state writes its own. The big question for Thanksgiving is pies that need a fridge.

Pumpkin, custard, cream and chiffon pies are made with eggs and milk. University of Illinois Extension says these pies should not be out of the fridge for more than two hours. Some cottage food laws, such as California’s, only cover foods that are safe without a fridge. So the classic Thanksgiving pie may not be allowed in your state.

Here is how two large states handle it, as we read their pages in October 2026:

Texas also limits how food reaches the customer. Its page allows online sales only when the food is delivered in person. You, an employee or someone in your household must deliver it. So shipping pies to another state is usually not an option for a home baker.

Other states have their own lists and rules. Some ask you to register, and some cap your yearly sales. Texas, for example, sets a limit of $150,000 a year. Call or email your state or county health department, and keep their answer in writing. This guide is not legal advice.

2. Keep the menu short

A long menu feels generous. But it slows you down in the busiest week of your year. Every extra flavor is another filling to make, another set of ingredients to buy and another label to check.

Pick three or four pies you make well and can bake in the same oven at the same temperature. Offer one size, such as a 9-inch pie. One size means one kind of pan, one kind of box and one price list that is easy to read.

Write the menu with the facts a customer needs to decide. Give the name, the size and the price. Add the main allergens (wheat, eggs, milk, nuts), and say if the pie must go in the fridge. You will answer fewer questions later.

3. Price it for your time, not just the ingredients

Customers compare your pie with the grocery store. You are not selling the same thing, so do not price it the same way.

Start from the ingredients. The USDA’s Economic Research Service put the ingredients for a homemade apple pie at about $8.80, using October 2024 prices. Then add the box, your time and your oven. Here is an illustrative example.

If the price feels high, look at your time first. Making crust in large batches saves more time than anything else. For the full method, see how to price custom orders.

4. Set a limit from your oven space

This is the step most home bakers skip. Your limit is not how many people ask. It is how many pies your oven can bake and cool before pickup.

Do the sum once, with your own oven:

Fruit pies can often be baked a day or two earlier, and pumpkin pies need room in your fridge. So check your fridge space too. If your fridge holds eight pies, that is your limit for pumpkin, whatever the oven says.

When you reach your limit, close orders, even if the cut-off date has not come yet. A post that says “Thanksgiving pies are full. Thank you for your orders.” is better than a pie you cannot finish.

5. Open and close orders on fixed dates

Give customers three dates: when orders open, when they close and when pickup is. For Thanksgiving 2026, a plan might look like this:

Think carefully before you offer pickup on Thanksgiving morning. You will be tired, and your customers will be busy cooking. Many bakers stop on Wednesday afternoon.

For other holidays in December, the same method works. See how to set a holiday order cut-off date.

6. Collect every order in one place

Pie orders arrive everywhere: DMs, texts, comments, a friend at church. The fix is one place where every order ends up, with the same details each time. Copy each message into that place as soon as you agree the order.

Each order needs:

• The customer’s name and phone number
• The pies and how many of each
• The pickup day and time slot
• The price, what has been paid and what is still owed
• Any allergy note or special request

A form can collect these for you. Google Forms works for this, and you can start from our free cake order form template. Whatever you use, send each customer a short confirmation, so you both have the same order in writing.

For more ready-made replies, see the WhatsApp order message templates. They work in any messaging app.

7. Take payment when the customer orders

A pie order with no payment is a promise that is easy to forget. When the plans change on Tuesday night, the unpaid pie is the one left on your table.

You have two good options. Take the full price when the customer orders, which is simple and suits a $30 pie. Or take a deposit and collect the rest at pickup. On WISMO, sellers who took a deposit usually asked for about half:

Median 50%

That median hides a wide range. Seller medians ran from 8% to 97%. For a busy holiday, more up front is safer. Read more in how much deposit to take on a custom order.

Write your rules in your menu post: when payment is due, and whether you refund it if the customer cancels. A simple policy is a full refund until your cut-off date, and none after it. By then, you have bought the supplies. Our guide to order cancellations has a sample policy.

8. Run pickup day like a schedule

Pickup day is where a good season can go wrong. Fifteen people arrive at 5 p.m., two boxes have the wrong name, and one customer never comes.

Bigger bakeries have the same problem. On Square’s seller forum, a pie shop asked in 2021 how to limit Thanksgiving orders to its two pickup days. Other bakeries replied with workarounds. One was a pickup-time option on each pie. Another was a printed count of orders for each day. Some still asked for a proper fix in 2025. The lesson for you is simple: plan pickup days and times yourself, whatever tool you use.

• Use time slots. Offer slots of 30 or 60 minutes, and cap the number of orders in each one. Four orders an hour is calm. Fifteen is a line in your driveway.
• Label every box the night before. Write the customer’s name, the pies and the pickup slot. Put the labels in slot order.
• Keep fridge pies in the fridge. Bring out pumpkin, custard and cream pies when the customer arrives, not before.
• Add a care card. Say how to store each pie. You can use the University of Illinois Extension guidance: fruit pies can stay at room temperature for up to two days, loosely covered. Pumpkin pie goes in the fridge and keeps up to four days.
• Check the balance at handover. Look at your list, not your memory, before the customer leaves.

Decide what happens with no-shows before the season starts, and say it in your menu post. For example: “If you cannot come in your slot, please message me. Pies not collected by 6 p.m. on Wednesday cannot be refunded.” Then send a short reminder the day before pickup with the slot and the address.

9. After Thanksgiving, plan for December

When the last box has gone, take ten minutes to write down what happened. How many pies did you sell? Which one sold out first? Did your limit feel right, or too high?

Then message your Thanksgiving customers about December. They already trust you, and most of them will host or bring dessert again soon. Our guide on following up with past customers shows when to send that message and what to say.

How WISMO helps with pie season

You can run this whole plan with a notebook and a calendar. WISMO is one way to keep it on your phone.

Each pie order goes into WISMO with the customer, the items, the price and the due date. You can add your pies to your catalogue, so you pick them from a list instead of typing them each time. The calendar shows which days are filling up, so you can see when you are close to your limit. At 8 a.m. in your time zone, WISMO reminds you about orders due tomorrow.

You record the deposit or full payment on each order. Before pickup, you can see who has paid and who still owes a balance. Each order also has a tracking link that your customer opens in any browser. You can name the steps in your own words, such as “Confirmed”, “Baking” and “Ready for pickup”. When a WISMO customer opened their link, they opened it a median of 5 times (262 orders from 96 sellers). Each open is an “is it ready yet?” message you did not have to answer.

WISMO does not take payments, and it does not send WhatsApp or text messages for you. You share the link yourself. You can also publish a free store page with your menu. Customers browse your pies there and send you a request.

Your first 30 orders are free. WISMO Pro is $9.99 a month or $99.99 a year, and adds unlimited orders and photo updates. For more on running a bakery order book, see how to manage custom cake orders.