What a $500 Minimum Order Actually Means

Every wholesale supplier has a minimum order, and most of them hide it until you ask. Ours is set by value: every product has a minimum order quantity worth at least $500, published on its product page. That stops some people ordering, and for a few of them it should.

Why a value, and not a number of units

A poly mailer costs a few cents and a roll of stretch film costs about fifteen dollars. A rule of “1,000 units” therefore meant a tiny order for one and a very large order for the other, and neither made sense. A minimum measured in money treats every product the same way: it is the smallest order that is worth picking, packing and shipping. In units that comes out as thousands of mailers, a thousand or two boxes, tens of thousands of labels and, for film, where each unit is expensive, just 72 rolls.

Divide it by your monthly volume

The only calculation that matters is how long the minimum lasts you. Take the minimum quantity on the product page and divide it by what you use in a month.

The rough rule: a minimum order should last you no more than about a year. Beyond that you are paying to store packaging, and the cash is better used elsewhere. The packaging quantity calculator does this sum for every product.

What it actually costs

Every minimum here is worth at least $500 at the standard size, and more at the larger ones, so the cheque is always roughly the same size. What differs is how far it goes: five hundred dollars of mailers is thousands of parcels, five hundred dollars of boxes is about a thousand, and five hundred dollars of labels is tens of thousands. Work in cost per parcel rather than cost per order, because that is the number that belongs in your margin.

Why suppliers have minimums at all

It is not a filter for serious buyers, and it is not arbitrary. Packaging is made in production runs. Setting up a run costs the same whether it produces five hundred units or fifty thousand, so short runs carry the setup cost on very few units and the price per unit becomes absurd.

Below a certain quantity a wholesale supplier is not cheaper than a retail box shop — it is more expensive, with worse availability. The minimum is where wholesale pricing starts making sense for you, not where it starts being profitable for us.

Where a minimum order goes

The practical question people forget. Every size page shows how many cartons the minimum is, and boxes are the line that surprises people: a minimum order of boxes is flat-packed cartons stacked onto a pallet, and it needs real space. If you work from home, check the space before you order, not after.

If you are not ready

We would rather say so than sell you three years of stock. Two honest options:

• Order only the product you use most. The minimum applies to each product separately, so buy the line you use most at its minimum, and keep buying the rest retail until your volume catches up.
• Wait. If you ship a few hundred parcels a month, retail packaging is genuinely the right answer for now. Come back when your volume would use a minimum order within a year.

We do not supply samples, free or paid, and the minimum order is the smallest order we accept. The minimum is the trial — it is enough to run the packaging properly for months and find out whether it suits you.

The questions worth asking before you commit

• How many months of cover is this minimum at my current volume?
• Where will it physically live?
• Is this specification settled, or am I still experimenting with sizes?
• What is the cost per parcel, and does that work in my margin?

If those four have comfortable answers, the minimum is not a barrier. If any of them makes you hesitate, tell us which one — there is usually a sensible way through it.