How to Price Pralines: Per Praline, With a Calculator

To price a wrapped pecan praline you add up its full cost first: the pecans, sugar, butter and milk by the batch, your time at an hourly rate, the cellophane wrapper and label, and a share of overhead like rent and power. That's what one praline costs you. Then set the price so that, after card and selling fees, it leaves the margin you want: price = full cost ÷ (1 − margin − fee rate). For a wrapped pecan praline that costs $1.84 to make, a 55% margin after 3% fees means $4.37, rounded up to $4.50. Pecans are more than half the ingredient cost, so the pecan price sets the praline price. A grocery pays less and marks it up at the register. In the example below, a Georgia home baker prices its pralines for the market and a grocery counter.

The short version

• Full cost = pecans, sugar, butter and milk a praline + your time + wrapper and label + overhead.
• Price = full cost ÷ (1 − margin − fee rate).
• Count your time at a real hourly rate, even if you don't pay yourself yet.
• Price from the pecans; they're most of the cost.
• Count the stirring and spooning: the candy has to be watched the whole time.
• Check what wholesale leaves after full cost before saying yes.
• TaroStack costs each praline from its recipe and what each batch used. More below.

What goes into a praline's cost

What Georgia allows is in georgia cottage food laws, and bags and boxes for candy in how to package candy for sale.

An example: a pecan praline

Peach Belt Bakehouse, the made-up home baker in Macon, Georgia, I use in these examples, cooks 36 pralines at a time:

At a 55% margin after 3% card fees, the price is $1.84 ÷ 0.42 = $4.37, so $4.50. At $4.50 a praline, each leaves $2.53. The market table had them at $3.00, which leaves $1.07. The grocery pays $2.75 for pralines by its register, which leaves $0.83; worth it at a standing order, not as the main line. What candy sells for at other margins is in candy business profit margin.

Get the calculator

Download the praline price calculator. One sheet: type the batch's ingredients, amounts and costs, the pralines it makes, the hands-on minutes, the wrapper and overhead, your hourly rate, card fees and the margin you want; the full cost, the price for your margin rounded up, and what a wholesale price and a test price leave fill in. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.

Where this stops working

The calculator prices one batch. Pecan prices jump after a short harvest, a humid day makes a batch that won't set, and a box of six for the holidays takes different packaging.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack costs each praline from its recipe and from what each batch used.

Recipes by weight. Each praline is a recipe, with unit conversion from the case or sack to the gram.

True cost from the batch. Each batch takes ingredients at their real cost, from the deliveries they came from, so a price rise shows up in the next batch.

Price creep. A price-creep report per supplier shows which ingredient is quietly costing more.

Recipes, batches and true cost are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.

Questions people also ask

How much should I charge for pralines?

Work out the full cost, pecans, sugar, butter, milk, your time, the wrapper and overhead, then divide by 1 minus your margin and fee rate; the example's $1.84 praline prices at $4.50 for a 55% margin.

How do you calculate the cost of pralines?

Add the batch's ingredients and divide by the pralines it makes, then add your time, the wrapper and a share of overhead.

What is a good profit margin on pralines?

Set your own target after fees; the example uses 55% on direct sales and accepts less on wholesale.

Why are pralines so expensive?

Pecans: in the example they're more than half the ingredient cost, and every batch has to be stirred and spooned by hand.