Sydney woman's polite cake request leads to hilarious mix-up on her brother's birthday

Published: 07:50, 17 July 2026 | Updated: 07:50, 17 July 2026 A custom-designed birthday cake in Sydney caused confusion when the customer collected her order and noticed something unusual written in the icing.  Tash Kessel ordered a cake from The Ice Cream Factory for her brother Brandon's 17th birthday, believing she had requested a simple 'Happy Birthday Brandon' design.  While completing the online order form, she included a note for the decorator that read: 'Please can you write 'Happy Birthday Brandon', thank you so much.' Little did she know that what she intended as a polite message would be interpreted literally by the bakery.  When Ms Kessel collected the cake, the icing read the full message instead of just the greeting: 'Happy Birthday Brandon, thank you so much.' 'I looked at it and I was like, "Wait, why does it say thank you so much?" The lady who gave it to me was also confused,' Ms Kessel told news.com.au. 'She said, "I was wondering why you wanted it to say that". 'She got out the slip that came with the cake... they must have gotten confused and written the whole thing.' Tash Kessel said her brother was 'confused' by an error with the custom icing message on his birthday cake after she left a polite note for the bakery in her instructions The Ice Cream Factory said it looked like she wanted to alter the inscription Ms Kessel said her brother was 'confused' but found the mistake 'funny' when she presented him with the cake.  'I didn't say anything until I actually presented the cake to him, but everyone in my family knew, so when we were singing Happy Birthday, everyone was already laughing,' she said. 'He looked at it and was like, "Why does it say thank you so much?" and I said, "Because, like, thank you so much for having a birthday".' Ms Kessel said the mix-up would not stop her buying from the bakery again because the 'cakes are amazing'.  The Sydney-based bakery, The Ice Cream Factory, has been making cakes for over 28 years. The bakery told the Daily Mail that it has made very few errors on custom cakes during that time.  Its owners explained that the online order form includes a field for customers to enter the cake inscription, as well as a separate comments section for requests such as food allergies or decoration instructions. 'There was no need for her to repeat the inscription. Being the polite lady she is, she could have just typed "thank you" in the comments,' they said. 'So it looked like she wanted to alter the inscription field as opposed to saying thank you to us.' The owners said the incident had been 'extremely humorous' and that staff were thrilled Ms Kessel and her family saw the same humour in it. The business added that it will double-check customer comments in future to help avoid similar misunderstandings.