How to Price Wreaths: Fresh, Deco Mesh and Dried

To price a wreath, add up the frame, the greens, mesh or dried flowers, the ribbon and bow, the cones, picks or sign, and the hanger and box, then the minutes it takes to make, and price for the margin you want after card fees. What changes from one wreath to the next is the mix: a fresh evergreen wreath is cheap greens and quick work on a clamp machine, a deco mesh wreath is mostly ribbon and mesh, and a dried flower wreath is mostly time. In the example below, a 24-inch fresh balsam wreath costs $14.37 and sells for $35, a deco mesh wreath costs $46.50 and sells for $100, and a dried flower wreath costs $38.50 and sells for $85. Below is what each costs, retail and fundraiser prices, the season, and a free calculator.

The short version

• Cost a wreath: frame, greens or mesh, ribbon and bow, decorations, hanger and box.
• Time each kind: 20 minutes for a fresh wreath on a clamp machine, longer for mesh and dried.
• Price = cost ÷ (1 − margin − card fees), rounded up to $5.
• Ribbon is the hidden cost of deco mesh; count every roll.
• Fundraisers and garden centers buy plain fresh wreaths at a wholesale price; price them from the cost.
• Fresh wreaths are a six-week season; buy greens and frames to the orders you've taken.
• TaroStack keeps frames, ribbon and greens counted and every wreath costed. More below.

What a wreath costs

Birch Hill Farm, a made-up Christmas tree farm in Montpelier, Vermont, I use in these examples, makes fresh balsam wreaths in November and December, and deco mesh and dried flower wreaths the rest of the year:

The balsam is 4 pounds of tips at 75 cents a pound, cut on the farm; a maker who buys tips pays more. A deco mesh wreath takes two rolls of mesh and three of ribbon, so ribbon is the line to watch. A dried flower wreath is glued stem by stem and takes an hour. How to put your own time into a price is in how to price handmade items.

Retail and fundraiser prices

Each retail price is the cost divided by (1 − 0.50 − 0.03), rounded up to $5. A school or club fundraiser that sells wreaths for $30 needs to buy them at about $20, which leaves the farm $5.63 a wreath; it works because a fundraiser orders 200 at once, before the season starts, and the farm can make them in long runs. How to set a price for anyone who resells your work is in how to price handmade items for wholesale.

The season

Fresh wreaths sell from the week before Thanksgiving to mid-December, so the year's fresh wreath business is about six weeks. Frames, ribbon and boxes are ordered in the fall, greens are cut as the orders come in, and a wreath made too early dries out before it's hung; outdoors in cold weather a fresh wreath keeps through the holidays, and indoors near heat it dries faster. The farm takes fundraiser and garden center orders in October, so it knows how many frames to buy, and makes retail wreaths to what sold the year before. Deco mesh and dried wreaths sell all year, with a fall and a spring bump, and keep, so they can be made in slow weeks. How to plan stock for a short season is in seasonal inventory.

Get the calculator

Download the wreath pricing calculator. Type what the frame, the greens, mesh or dried flowers, the ribbon and bow, decorations, hanger and box and the wire and glue cost, the minutes a wreath takes, your hourly rate, card fees, the margin you want and a wholesale price. It works out the cost of a wreath, its price rounded up to $5, what's left, and what the wholesale price leaves. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.

Where this stops working

Frames in four sizes, ribbon in twenty colors, three fundraisers and two garden centers with orders due the same week, retail wreaths at the farm stand and online, and greens cut daily. A sheet can't say whether there are enough 24-inch rings for the orders already taken, how much red velvet ribbon is left, or whether fundraisers or retail paid better this year.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack keeps frames, ribbon and greens counted and every wreath costed.

Supplies in stock. Frames, ribbon, cones, boxes and greens are items, counted on a phone and kept at what you paid, and units convert: ribbon bought by the roll, used by the yard.

Wreaths as recipes. Each wreath is a recipe of its frame, greens, ribbon, decorations and box. Recording a day's run takes them off stock at what you paid and gives the cost of each, and fundraiser and garden center orders are sales orders for their delivery day that show whether the frames and ribbon are there while you're still typing.

And what each line earns. The reorder list works in days of cover against each supplier's lead time, so the rings arrive before November, and margins are reported by product and by customer, so the fundraiser that ordered 200 and the retail wreaths can be compared.

Recipes, batches, sales orders and margins by product and customer 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 a wreath?

Cost it from the frame, greens or mesh, ribbon, decorations, box and your time, then divide by one minus your margin and fees. In the example, a fresh balsam wreath costing $14.37 sells for $35.

How much should I sell a deco mesh wreath for?

In the example, a 24-inch deco mesh wreath with two rolls of mesh and three of ribbon costs $46.50 to make and sells for $100.

How much does it cost to make a fresh Christmas wreath?

In the example, about $7.70 of ring, balsam, bow, cones and bag, and $14.37 with 20 minutes of time on a clamp machine.

What should I charge a fundraiser for wreaths?

A price that lets the group resell at a profit and still leaves you something. In the example, $20 a wreath for a group selling at $30, which leaves the farm $5.63.