Consignment and Wholesale Pricing Calculator for Makers
Enter one batch's materials, hours and overhead to get your cost per item and a direct price. It then shows what a shop's wholesale or consignment terms would leave you, with every step of the arithmetic shown.
Most pricing calculators stop at a retail price. The question that catches makers out comes later, when a shop asks for wholesale terms or offers to take your work on consignment: does the price you chose still cover what the item costs you once someone else takes their share?
Fill in one batch of one product. The numbers update as you type. Nothing you enter leaves your browser.
What each number means
Cost per item you can sell. Materials and your hours for the whole batch, divided by the items you can actually sell, not the items you made. Seconds, samples and breakages still used materials and time, so the saleable items carry them. A share of the month's overhead is added on top: monthly overhead divided by the items you sell in a month.
Direct price. The price at which, after platform and payment fees, your chosen margin is left over: cost divided by (1 minus fees minus margin). Margin here is a share of the price, not a markup on the cost, which is why a 30% margin needs more than cost plus 30%.
Wholesale. A shop buying outright pays your wholesale price and sells at its own markup. At 2x (keystone), a 30.00 retail price means the shop pays you 15.00. If 15.00 is below your cost, every wholesale order loses money however many you sell, and the only fixes are a higher retail price, a lower cost, or not wholesaling that item.
Consignment. The shop holds your work and pays you a share when it sells, in splits such as 60/40 or 70/30. Your payout is the retail price times your share. The calculator gives the retail price you need to break even, and the one that keeps your target margin.
Before the detail: the pricing checks are free by email, one short email each, with a one-page summary to print.
What it leaves out
Tax, shipping, discounts, currency conversion and the time spent delivering to shops are not included. Enter amounts in one currency throughout; the calculator does not convert anything. It judges one product against one shop at a time.
Common questions
What does the calculator leave out?
Shipping, tax and discounts. The Maker's Pricing Workbook includes shipping and discounts and keeps your records between products.
Is the calculator enough on its own?
It is free and complete for one product; the workbook is for keeping track once several products sit in several shops.
Where is the method explained?
In how to price what you make, and in the craft-by-craft guides that apply it.
If you sell through several shops
The Maker Business Bundle is everything around this page in one download, for $24: the Maker's Pricing Workbook, 14 Shop Selling Pages for choosing shops and checking every payout, the Market Day Record Kit, and Craft Costing Sheets for six crafts (soap, candles, crochet, jewelry, baked goods, stickers; 8 pages) that are only in this bundle. The calculator above is free and complete for one product; the bundle is for keeping track once several products sit in several shops and markets.
If you only need the spreadsheet, The Maker's Pricing Workbook is the cheaper option on its own: the spreadsheet version of this page, with batch costs in twelve material, six labour and six overhead rows, a price tab with fees, shipping and discounts, the same wholesale and consignment verdicts, a consignment record for up to 8 shops with 200 dated lines, and a one-page line sheet.
The method behind both is in how to price what you make, and the craft-by-craft guides apply it to crochet, candles and baked goods.