So most businesses, schools, etc used to have king cake parties every Friday of carnival- the person who go the baby brought the cake the next week
So a number of cakes needed to be big enough to have slices anywhere from 10-30ish people
So I think a few things are happening
- generally Katrina reset everything. A lot of traditions didn’t survive intact. Workplace changed a bunch, but mostly the boujie/hipster wave that hit NO around 2012, shifted an emphasis to boutique-y king cakes vs mom n pop or store brand types
People could handle getting a Sucre king cake for family but no one was going to get a big ol specialty one for the whole office
Covid then was probably the final nail in the ubiquity of the large king cake