To sell soap wholesale, get the cost of a bar down to half the wholesale price first, because a shop pays about 60% of the shelf price and what's left has to cover your bar. Then sell by the case with a minimum and clear terms, take bars to shops whose customers already buy soap, and keep six weeks of cured stock ahead, because a reorder can't wait for a cure. In the example below, a skincare maker in Kailua finds its $6 wholesale bar leaves only 36% at its old batch size, moves to 40-bar batches to bring it to 50%, and sells eight shops $14,313 in a year, which leaves about $7,500 after the products' cost. Below is the cost, the terms, finding shops, an opening order, the first year, and a free calculator.
The short version
- A shop buys at 50% to 60% of its shelf price; at $10 on the shelf, that's $5 to $6.
- Your cost needs to be about half the wholesale price or less; batch size is where it falls.
- Sell by the case, with an opening minimum and a reorder minimum, and write the terms down.
- Take a few bars and the line sheet to shops whose customers already buy soap.
- Keep the shop's price and yours the same, online and at markets.
- Cold process soap cures for weeks: keep six weeks of cured bars ahead of the reorders.
- TaroStack gives every batch a lot, holds curing bars from sale, and takes each shop's order. More below.
First, the cost of a bar
Hoʻola Botanicals, a made-up skincare maker in Kailua, Oʻahu, I use in these examples, sells its 5-ounce bar for $10 at markets and $6 to shops. At its old batch size, 19 bars in two hours, that doesn't work:
| Per 5 oz bar | 19-bar batch | 40-bar batch |
|---|---|---|
| Oils and lye | $1.34 | $1.34 |
| Box and label | $0.40 | $0.40 |
| Labor at $20 an hour | $2.11 (2 h a batch) | $1.25 (2.5 h a batch) |
| Cost of a bar | $3.85 | $2.99 |
| Left at $6 wholesale | $2.15, 35.8% | $3.01, 50.2% |
A slab mold of 40 bars takes half an hour longer to make than a loaf of 19, and the labor in each bar falls by 86 cents. Nothing else changed: same oils, same box, same price. What a bar costs, line by line, is in soap making cost calculator, and how margins compare by channel in soap business profit margin.
Prices, cases and terms
| Product | Cost | Wholesale | Suggested retail | Case pack | Case price | Your margin | Shop's margin |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cold process soap, 5 oz bar | $2.99 | $6.00 | $10.00 | 12 | $72.00 | 50.2% | 40% |
| Whipped body butter, 4 oz | $4.65 | $10.50 | $18.00 | 6 | $63.00 | 55.7% | 41.7% |
| Sugar scrub, 8 oz | $3.33 | $8.00 | $16.00 | 6 | $48.00 | 58.4% | 50% |
At $10 on the shelf, the shop keeps 40% of a bar. Some shops want 50%, which would mean $5 wholesale; a shop that sells soap fast, like a grocery or a spa, can take 40% because the bars turn over. Hoʻola's terms: a $200 opening order, $100 to reorder, by the case, two scents to a case of soap, the first order paid when it's placed and net 30 after that, shipping in five business days, paid by the shop. A line sheet that sets these out is in line sheet template.
Finding shops
Shops whose customers already buy soap: boutiques, gift shops, spas, natural groceries, florists, farm stands and hotel gift shops. Bring two or three bars to hand over, the line sheet, and the body butter to try, and ask for the buyer. Shops often ask whether you carry insurance and what's in the bars, so bring the ingredient list and know your answers. Cosmetics, like the body butter, carry their own label rules, set out in cosmetic labeling requirements. Before the first order, a short application with the shop's resale certificate and billing details, like the one in wholesale account application form.
An opening order
A Kailua boutique's first order:
| Product | Cases | Units | Each | Total | Left after cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cold process soap, six scents | 3 | 36 | $6.00 | $216.00 | $108.36 |
| Whipped body butter | 1 | 6 | $10.50 | $63.00 | $35.10 |
| Sugar scrub | 1 | 6 | $8.00 | $48.00 | $28.02 |
| The order | 5 | 48 | $327.00 | $171.48 |
It's over the $200 minimum and leaves 52.4% after cost.
The first year
| Shop | Opening order | Reorders a year | Average reorder | The year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boutique, Kailua | $327 | 6 | $220 | $1,647 |
| Spa, Ko Olina | $366 | 6 | $300 | $2,166 |
| Natural grocery, Kaimukī | $432 | 10 | $260 | $3,032 |
| Gift shop, Haleʻiwa | $327 | 5 | $200 | $1,327 |
| Hotel gift shop, Waikīkī | $462 | 8 | $320 | $3,022 |
| Florist, Mānoa | $216 | 4 | $130 | $736 |
| Farm stand, Waimānalo | $216 | 8 | $120 | $1,176 |
| Gift shop, Kona, shipped | $327 | 4 | $220 | $1,207 |
| Eight shops | $2,673 | $14,313 |
The reorders are $11,640 of the year's $14,313. The grocery and the hotel shop reorder most, because soap there is something people use up and buy again, not a gift bought once. At 52.4% after cost, the year leaves about $7,500. At the old 19-bar batches, the soap in it would have left about 14 points less.
Curing ahead of the reorders
A bar poured the day a reorder arrives can't ship for weeks. Keep at least six weeks of cured bars of every scent the shops stock, and pour from the reorders' pace, not from what's on the rack. Every bar carries its batch code, so a shop's question about a bar that sweated or a customer's reaction leads to the batch and its oils. How to set batch codes is in how to create batch numbers for soap.
Get the calculator
Download the soap wholesale calculator. Three sheets: prices, where each product's cost, wholesale price, suggested retail and case pack give the case price and both margins; opening order, where a shop's cases give the units, total and what it leaves, checked against your minimum; and shops, one line for each shop with its opening order, reorders a year and average reorder, where the year's wholesale and what it leaves fill in. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
Eight shops reordering on their own schedules, eight scents of soap each curing for weeks from a different pour, butters and scrubs, a Sunday market and a website, all from one rack. A spreadsheet can't say whether there will be two cases of cured lavender for the grocery's reorder in three weeks, or which shops got the batch that sweated.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack gives every batch a lot, holds curing bars from sale, and takes each shop's order.
Curing as a hold. Each batch of soap takes its oils and lye off stock and gets a lot of its own; while it cures, it can be held, kept out of what can be sold, and released when it's ready, so an order only sees cured bars.
Orders and picking. Each shop's order is a sales order that shows whether there's enough as it's typed, the day's orders make one picking list with the earliest lots first, and the lots each shop got are recorded as it ships. One report shows which shops got the batch that sweated.
Margins by shop. Margins are reported by product and by customer, so the grocery's 40% shelf margin and the spa's butters each show what they leave. Batch costs come from what the oils cost, so moving to 40-bar batches shows in the cost of every bar.
| The job | Spreadsheet | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| Cured bars for the reorder | Dates on the rack | Held until cured, then released |
| The cost of a bar | Worked out once | From every batch |
| Which shops got batch 22 | Search the invoices | Lots recorded as it ships |
| What each shop leaves | Not worked out | Margins by customer |
Batches, lots, holds, sales orders and margin reports 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.