My Candle COGS Is ₹250 and I Want It Below ₹200 — How Do I Set a Specific Savings Target for Each Raw-Material Component?

The ₹250.00 BOM, ranked

You gave two figures: ₹250.00 now and a ₹200.00 target, a ₹50.00 cut, 20.0% of the candle. The split below is illustrative: it sums to your ₹250.00, uses the series' default 200 g candle at a 9% load, and labels every unit price as the reader's own supplier's. It is not a CSI price list and not a claim that anyone's supplier is overpriced. Replace each line with yours.

Fragrance and wax hold 70.9% of this candle; the jar and box most of the rest. The last column is the trap: an even split by share. It looks fair and it is wrong, because it asks each line for money in proportion to its size, not to what a real alternative can take out of it. The next section prices those alternatives. If your own BOM is not built yet, the full BOM audit is the method; whether your ₹250.00 is per poured or per saleable candle is the true-cost post.

Each line's achievable gap, at real prices

Each lever below is priced on the candle as it stands after the lever before it, so nothing is counted twice. The fragrance load comes first because it changes the grams on two lines.

Fragrance: two levers, one of them a different scent

Lever A cuts the load from 9% to 8% of total weight: 18 g of oil becomes 16 g, worth ₹10.00 at ₹5,000.00 a kilo; the fill stays 200 g, so ₹0.96 of wax replaces it. Net ₹9.04 a candle, if a blind burn test shows 8% throws as well. Some oils need the higher load and some do not; only your test knows. How to find the lowest load that still throws is the lowest effective load post. Lever B prices a same-family oil: 16 g of Woody Oud at ₹4.53 a gram is ₹72.50 against ₹80.00, ₹7.50 less. That is a scent change, not a purchase: comparing two oils at different prices and loads is the ₹5,000 vs ₹3,500 per kilo fragrance post, and the retests a supplier switch needs are the fragrance-switch test list.

Wax: the biggest single gap, and the riskiest

After lever A the candle carries 184 g of wax at ₹480.00 a kilo: ₹88.32. Two CSI soy waxes cost less. Eco Soy CSI 400 at ₹399.00 a kilo gives ₹73.42, ₹14.90 a candle. Natural Soy Pearl at ₹424.80 a kilo from 5 kg gives ₹78.16, ₹10.16 a candle, but its page describes a pearlescent shimmer, so it changes the look. Two more do not help this reader at all: CSI 464 would add ₹5.04 a candle, the 10 kg Chunks ₹22.06. Any wax change reopens wick, throw, finish, adhesion and cure, which is why lever C is stretch. The change-control maths of a cheaper wax is the cheaper-wax revalidation post.

Jar and box: smaller lines, real room

The jar is only 13.2% of this candle, so an even split asks it for ₹6.60. But its gap is bigger: your supplier's next tier of the same jar (₹30.00, a worked quote) is a low-risk ₹3.00; a lighter jar of the same capacity (₹22.00, a worked quote) is ₹11.00, and visible. CSI cannot help with this jar: our 200 ml jars hold less than 200 g of wax, and the in-stock CSI jars stated to hold 200 g or more start at ₹150.00. For a smaller, cheaper line, the clear 200ml Salsa at ₹29.50 a jar in 50s is the cheapest same-capacity glass we list; what a jar change must retest is the jar-change retest post. The box gives ₹7.58 by swapping a ₹30.00 printed box for our kraft Corrugated Box 11 x 11 x 8 cm at ₹22.42: visible, quick to test, and only if your jar fits.

The target table: committed and stretch

Read the table three ways. Line targets tell each owner what their line must fall by: fragrance ₹17.50, wax ₹13.94, jar ₹11.00, box ₹7.58. Committed targets (₹19.62) are what you promise yourself: ₹230.38 by the end of the first month of tests. Stretch targets (₹30.40) are what gets you under ₹200.00, at ₹199.98, and only if a different oil, a different wax and a lighter jar all pass. If the six levers were independent, the chance of all of them passing on these judgement probabilities is about 5.4%; the expected saving is ₹29.39, a candle near ₹220.61.

If ₹200.00 must be met with certainty, the honest options are outside materials: a price change (negotiate, reformulate or raise price), a smaller fill on a new SKU, or a deliberate jar tier change tested on buyers. How 10% and 20% COGS cuts are planned with the protection checklist for each attribute is the 10–20% COGS post; whether one big saving or several small ones is the better bet is the one-versus-several post.

Test-gated timeline, tests and payback

At 500 candles a month the full plan is worth ₹3,00,120.00 a year; the committed part ₹1,17,720.00; the risk-adjusted expectation ₹1,76,340.00. All five tests pay back in about 0.43 months if they pass, 0.73 months against the risk-adjusted saving; the committed tests (A and E) pay back in about 0.34 months. At 2,000 candles a month the full plan is worth ₹12,00,480.00. Every test candle is costed at full material price; the perception test for D2 is extra, and the validation-depth post sets how deep each kind of change must be tested.

Keeping the targets honest every month

Target costing fails in small businesses for one reason: the target outlives the facts. A test fails, a price moves, and the rupees get found somewhere unsafe. A monthly loop prevents that.

Booked savings belong in a versioned BOM, v1 against v2, with yields and rejects; that proof is the before-and-after BOM post. Turning the monthly review into a standing system with a test queue and approval gates is the continuous cost-optimisation system. And once the formula is settled, the purchasing side of the cluster begins: which supplier price to renegotiate first as volume grows is the 500 to 5,000 a month post.

What to buy for the tests, and what to skip

Six items, chosen on page statements, price and stock on 4 October 2026; CSI publishes no throw or burn data, so nothing is ranked on performance. Wax counts use 184 g per 200 g candle at 8%; oil counts use 16 g.

Skip for this plan: 1 kg bottles before lever B passes (the 100 g is the same ₹4.53 a gram), 5 kg or 10 kg wax before lever C passes, and any wick change for money. Bigger packs of flat-priced items buy stock, not savings.

Map of this cluster: 6081–6100

This hub owns the target-setting method and the ₹250.00 → ₹200.00 allocation. The cluster then turns to profit and purchasing: how savings add up, which supplier terms to work on, how to switch safely, and how to keep the system running. One line per post:

Frequently asked questions