A Client Approved Lavender but Later Wants to Change to Oud After I Bought the Fragrance — How Should Custom Raw-Material Purchases Be Handled Commercially?

The order, the purchase and the change, as numbers

The title gives no figures, so this is a worked example you replace with your own: 500 candles of 200 g at 8% (16 g oil + 184 g wax each), quoted at ₹475.00 a candle (₹2,37,500.00, your price, not a CSI figure), 50% advance (₹1,18,750.00) paid. The client signed a physical lavender sample; you then bought the oil for 532 pours (8,627.12 g with extras, 4% rejects, 1% heel and a 30 g reference) as 8 × 1 kg + 500 g + 100 g + 50 g of Lavender, and printed 520 labels naming the scent. Five days later, before any pouring, the client asks for oud. The wedding is 38 days away.

Had the client changed before you bought, this would be a sampling question with cheaper answers (when to stop buying during sampling). It is a commercial question now because money has left your account against their approval.

Reusable or client-specific: the first question

Every purchase for a custom order falls into one of two groups. Reusable stock is what you would use in your own range anyway: standard wax, common wicks, plain jars, and popular oils such as lavender. Client-specific stock is what only this client wanted: an unusual oil you do not otherwise sell, a custom colour mixed in bulk, a jar you will not reuse, anything printed with their names, date or scent. The fair commercial answer differs between the two.

How much buffer to buy of things that are client-specific, so that a change or a cancellation hurts less, is the custom-materials buffer post; a custom jar you cannot reuse is 6352.

The exposure, line by line

Three things stand out. First, the Lavender itself (₹45,198.00) is not the loss; at 1.5 kg a month your range uses it in about 5.77 months, and the real cost is the money tied up meanwhile (₹1,954.81 at a 1.5% monthly cost of money, both your figures). Second, the printed labels are the only line that is gone completely. Third, the oil price difference can dwarf everything else: Woody Oud is ₹689.80 a kilo cheaper than Lavender, so this change actually lowers your oil bill by ₹5,958.28; a switch to White Royal Oud would raise it by ₹25,297.00.

Five ways to handle it

Which one, in this case?

Lavender is reusable and Woody Oud is cheaper, so option C is the fair default: send the client the line-by-line costs (₹7,179.24), show the oil saving (₹5,958.28), and ask for the difference, ₹1,220.96. It is small enough that some makers will absorb it as goodwill (option B); that is a choice, and it is easier to make once you have seen the figure. Option A belongs to client-specific purchases. Option E is worth offering whenever the wedding has more than one function: 150 lavender candles for a mehendi or welcome hamper would use about 2,520 g of the oil within the order.

The direction of the price difference matters as much as the change itself. If the client had asked for White Royal Oud, the same change would put ₹32,476.24 on the table, ₹64.95 a candle. Change terms that only speak of "change costs" leave that unaddressed; terms that say "plus any difference in material cost" cover both directions, including a credit when the new oil is cheaper.

Does the oud still fit before the wedding?

Woody Oud is a different oil from Lavender in weight and character, and heavier resinous oils commonly behave differently on the same wick. So the oud goes through its own round before you buy 8.65 kg of it: the approved load, a C2 and a Cotton Braided candle, cured 72 hours (the Woody Oud page says to cure soy candles 48–72 hours before burn testing), burned, and a physical sample sent for signature.

The decision rule. If the days fit, run the test round and quote the change at the same time, so the client approves both together. If they do not fit, offer a choice in writing: a new delivery date, or a split (part lavender, part oud, or the oud only for the main function). Never skip the oud burn test to make the date; and if CSI cannot confirm the oud in one lot for 8.65 kg, plan a lot check on the second lot rather than mixing lots unseen (what to retest when only the fragrance changes).

Change terms to write into the next order

The wording below is practical business judgement, not legal advice; for anything unusual, or large, take proper advice. The point is that the client should know before they sign what a change after purchase costs.

The products in this change

Five CSI products: the oil you bought, the oil requested, a dearer oud for contrast, and the wax and wicks you already hold. Nothing is ranked on performance (CSI publishes no burn data).

Frequently asked questions