There are certain desserts one expects to find in the fluorescent glow of a supermarket bakery case. One of those things is cakes — anniversary cakes with pink rosettes, birthday cakes with colorful piping, holiday cakes with predictable messages. What you might not expect is a cake featuring an alien in a pink spaceship casting a beam of light, with the inscription: “Get in loser, we’re going to therapy.”
But at the Walmart on Brooks Street in Missoula, you can count on finding exactly that kind of cake. On a recent visit to the big-box store’s bakery, the display case contained a cookie cake featuring the green protagonist from the animated horror web series “Salad Fingers.” Another was decorated with the sandworms from Dune. A third cake had a hedgehog in pink pajamas with the words, “Saturday Night Out! Just Kidding. I’m in my jammies.”
Over the past year, photos of the cakes have been turning up on the r/Missoula subreddit, where fans share their latest finds and draw hundreds of reactions.
“The horrors persist, but so do I.”
In a post from two months ago titled, “For the Love of Unhinged Cakes,” users have been sharing their favorites, including a frosted cake featuring a caterpillar bearing the words “My final form,” a strawberry cake that reads “The horrors persist, but so do I,” and another that declares, also with no apparent occasion, “I could tear up a Chinese Buffet right about now.”
On Mother’s Day, Reddit users posted images of the bakery’s cake options that included one saying, “Please accept this Mothers Day cake as a token of my poverty” and “Mommm, you forgot to remind me that Mother’s Day is THIS Sunday.”
The post that started it all, from late last year, is titled “Dear Missoula cake decorators” and reads: “You’re doing great work! I’ve never related to a Walmart cake before today. Just one quick question though. Are you OK?”
“I wanna be friends with the cake designer,” wrote one commenter.
“What in tarnation — give that person the key to the city,” added another.
One lamented being gluten intolerant and some others — the regulars — admit to stopping by the bakery case on every visit, just to see what's new.
A Reddit user claiming to be one of the decorators — with the display name “UnhingedCakeDecorator” — eventually surfaced in the thread to respond:
"hi, one of the brooks walmart cake decorators here! :D there's actually two of us! this one was made by the other decorator. i appreciate the concern, yes we are okay 💀 the weird unhinged stuff sells better and it's just more fun to make lol."
Attempts by The Pulp to speak with the cake decorators directly were thwarted by a corporate approval process. On their personal Reddit page, UnhingedCakeDecorator (username: WindyMover) says they will take requests for cakes, adding, “but it has to be at least moderately appropriate unless you directly place an order (which we would LOVE).”
For now, the Walmart cake artists remain anonymous, which just layers the intrigue. The decorators, though, seem more than willing to meet their many fans. UnhingedCakeDecorator’s apparent co-conspirator, “cakesbyzoey,” recently wrote: “We are there till 2 or 3 everyday :)”
