The shop wants wholesale. Can your price afford it?
Retail, keystone wholesale, and a consignment split, side by side — with your real cost in the math, so a channel that loses money says so before you say yes. The conventions are named and yours to change. Everything stays in your browser.
The piece
The numbers here are yours to check. This page does arithmetic on what you type — it cannot see your recipe, your equipment or your batch.
Want it to remember?
In MadeKeeper every piece already knows its true cost — materials consumed at make — so the wholesale question answers itself from your real numbers, and the consignment pieces are tracked at the venue until they sell. See for every maker or poke around the live demo. $19/mo for the whole back office, kept for as long as you stay. The shop stays free for cost a piece and one fair — no product cap. The tax packet, Etsy and Square, and more fairs are the $19.
One price, three channels, honest margins
The wholesale email is flattering right up until the math runs. The math below is the same math the calculator runs — conventions named, margins honest, the losing channel visible in advance.
What is keystone pricing?
The trade convention that wholesale is half of retail — the store doubles what it pays you. It exists because the store's half funds their rent, staff and risk, and it means a retail price set without wholesale in mind is a trap: if your $40 price barely clears cost at $40, the $20 wholesale version loses money on every unit. Price for keystone from the start, or know you're declining wholesale.
How do consignment splits work?
The gallery sells your piece and keeps a share — commonly 40%, so 60% to you; some venues run 50/50. Nothing pays until the piece sells, the inventory risk stays yours, and the piece is out of your booth while it waits. The split percentage is the negotiable, stated-up-front number, which is why it's a setting here.
Which channel is best?
They answer different questions. Retail pays most per piece but you did the selling. Wholesale pays least but moves quantity with one invoice and no booth day. Consignment sits between — better share than wholesale, no sale guaranteed. The trap isn't picking one; it's setting a retail price that only works in one and then saying yes to the others.
Should my labor be in the cost line?
For margin math like this, put in your materials cost first — that shows the hard floor, the price below which a sale literally loses cash. Your time belongs in the price above that floor. If a channel's margin can't pay your materials AND leave something real for your hours, that channel needs a different price — or a polite no.