At What Production Quantity Does Buying Fragrance Oil by the Kilogram Become More Economical than Repeatedly Purchasing 100 g or 500 g Packs?

Where the price steps really are

Across the Fragrance Oils collection, the per-gram price of the same oil behaves very differently at each step up the pack ladder. Here is the whole-catalogue pattern, from the live pull on 24 September 2026:

The first row is the one that matters for every maker. Buying 15 g testers repeatedly, for production rather than testing, is the most expensive habit on the ladder. At 16 g per 200 g candle, Lavender poured from 15 g bottles costs ₹112.02 of oil per candle, against ₹86.40 from 100 g: ₹25.62 more on every candle. Above 100 g, most oils are priced in a straight line, so the question "when is the kilo cheaper?" usually has the answer "it isn't, per gram".

The break-even order, oil by oil

For an oil with a real kilo break, the question becomes: how much do I need in one order before the kilo, even with oil left over, costs less than the small bottles? Against 100 g bottles the answer is simple arithmetic: divide the kilo price by the 100 g price and round up. If the result is 9, the kilo costs less than nine 100 g bottles, so it wins once you need more than 800 g. Against a mix of 100 g and 500 g bottles, the threshold is higher, because the 500 g is often priced close to the kilo. Here are all 24 oils with a kilo saving of 5% or more, with stock flagged:

Of the 24, 19 had both the 100 g and the 1 kg in stock on the pull date. Rajnigandha, Regal Royal Oud and Sacred Sandal Ember had neither size in stock, and Freshwater and Vetiver had no 1 kg in stock, so their thresholds are academic until they return. The candle column divides the 100 g threshold by 16 g, the oil in a 200 g candle at 8%, with no allowance; if your candles are 150 g, multiply by 16 ÷ 12. The 500 g or 1 kg page covers the 500 g comparison in terms of months of cover.

When the kilo never wins on price

For the 52 oils priced within 1% per gram between 100 g and 1 kg, the staircase in the diagram only reaches the kilo line at the tenth bottle, when you need the full kilo anyway. Lavender's kilo (₹5,221.00) is ₹179.00 cheaper than ten 100 g bottles (₹5,400.00), a 3.3% difference that only applies when you need more than 900 g. Sandalwood, Woody Oud and Gilli Mitti (Patchouli) are exactly flat from 100 g to 1 kg. For these oils the economic question is not the per-gram price at all. It is how often you want to order, how much cash you want on the shelf, and how much a stock-out would cost you.

There is one more route beyond the listed packs. For larger quantities than 1 kg of an oil, or a mixed production order, CSI quotes on WhatsApp. No volume discount figure is published, so do not assume one; ask with your oils and quantities. A supplier offering a better rate at 5 kg shows how to test whether a larger quote is worth taking at your monthly sales.

The cost of buying often

"Repeatedly purchasing" small packs has a cost that no price list shows: each order takes your time, and may carry a delivery charge, a payment fee, or a trip. None of these is a CSI figure, and they differ for every buyer. To show how they change the answer, here is 1 kg of use bought three ways with an example ₹80.00 per order for your own delivery and handling. Replace it with your real figure:

With any real per-order cost, the kilo pulls ahead of ten small orders even for a flat-priced oil like Lavender: here by ₹899.00, almost all of it overhead. But the 500 g route, two orders, is within ₹99.00 of the kilo. The practical conclusion: stop buying 100 g bottles one at a time for production. Whether the next step is 500 g or 1 kg depends on how fast you use the oil, which the 500 g or 1 kg page works out in months of cover.

A buying plan by volume

In candles, with 16 g of oil per 200 g candle at 8%: under about 30 candles per order of a scent, 100 g bottles; 30 to 60 candles, check the threshold for that oil; over 60 candles per order, the kilo. For 150 g candles (12 g of oil), the same thresholds cover a third more candles. If you are costing a whole range, fragrance inventory across ten scents sorts fast and slow sellers, and splitting ₹1 lakh of raw-material budget shows how the choice affects cash.

The same logic scales up. 1,000 × 100 g candles: 1 kg packs or a larger bulk quantity applies it to a single large order, the 100 kg vs 25 kg wax decision to wax, and growing from 1,000 to 10,000 candles a month to the point where retail packs give way to wholesale quantities.

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