Should I Compare Candle Jar Suppliers by Price per Piece or Landed Cost After GST, Freight, Breakage and Replacement?

Why price per piece answers the wrong question

A price per piece is a number the supplier controls. Landed cost is the number you pay. Between them sit four things that vary more between suppliers than the piece price does: how freight is charged (included, separate, per kg, with a minimum), how many jars arrive unusable, whether those are replaced and on whose freight, and how much of your time the order consumes. Two quotes a few rupees apart per piece can swap places once these are in.

There is a second reason. Per-piece quotes are often not like for like. One supplier quotes "+ GST", another "inclusive"; one includes a lid, another sells it separately; one quotes at 500, another at 100. Before any maths, normalise: same jar specification, same quantity, same GST basis, same things included. If one quote leaves out the lid, add the lid's price to it. If a quote is at a quantity you will not buy, re-quote at yours.

This guide builds the whole landed cost. If breakage is the only difference between your two suppliers, the cost-per-usable-jar guide goes deeper into breakage stages, after-pour losses and the break-even rate. If one supplier is nearby and one is far away, the local-versus-distant guide adds lead time and replacement speed.

The landed-cost build-up, line by line

Here is every line that belongs in a landed-cost comparison, where the number comes from, and the usual trap. Fill in one column per supplier.

Sum lines 1 to 8 (with 2 adding any missing items, and 3 applied as described below), then divide by usable jars: the jars you ordered, minus those written off and not replaced. That is landed cost per usable jar.

GST: same basis first, then decide whether it is a cost

Two separate questions sit inside "what about GST?". The first is arithmetic: are both quotes on the same basis? The second is accounting: is GST a cost to your business at all? Keep them apart.

Question 1: are both quotes on the same basis?

A quote of ₹55.00 + GST and a quote of ₹64.00 "all inclusive" look ₹9.00 apart. They are not. Which is cheaper depends entirely on the GST rate that applies to the goods: the two are equal when the rate is 16.4% (because 55.00 × 1.164 ≈ 64.00). If the rate on the invoice is above that, the inclusive quote is cheaper; below it, the "+ GST" quote is. We are not stating the rate for glass jars here; take it from the supplier's invoice or pro forma, or ask your accountant. Then restate every quote in the same form before comparing.

Do the same for freight and other charges: ask whether they are invoiced with GST, and put them on the same basis as the goods. A GST invoice from each supplier is what makes the comparison and any credit claim possible. CSI provides a GST invoice; confirm the basis of any CSI quote you compare, as with anyone else's.

Question 2: is GST a cost to you?

If your business is GST-registered and can claim input tax credit on the purchase, the GST you pay is largely recoverable, so compare quotes on their pre-GST landed cost and treat GST as a cash-flow item: you pay it now and recover it later. If you are not registered, or cannot claim the credit, GST is part of your cost: multiply each taxable line by (1 + the invoice rate) and compare on that. If every taxable line carries the same rate, GST scales the goods and freight of both quotes alike and rarely changes their ranking; the mistakes come from mixing bases. This is general guidance, not tax advice: your accountant decides how your purchases are treated.

Freight per usable jar, and why small orders carry more of it

Freight is charged per consignment; you need it per usable jar. Divide the consignment's freight by usable jars, not jars ordered: in the worked example, ₹2,500.00 over 500 jars ordered is ₹5.00 a jar, but over 475 usable jars it is ₹5.26.

We are not going to quote you freight rates: they depend on your pin code, the courier or transporter, carton count, and whether the consignment is billed on actual or volumetric weight. Couriers commonly bill on whichever of the two is higher, so bulky cartons of glass can be billed above their scale weight; check your courier's terms. What we can say is structural. Where part of a freight or handling charge is fixed, such as a minimum charge, small orders carry more of it per jar: an illustrative ₹600.00 fixed charge is ₹6.00 a jar on 100 jars and ₹1.20 on 500. That is a reason to consolidate jar, wax and wick purchases into fewer, larger orders once your jar is proven.

Worked example: ₹55.00 plus freight against ₹62.00 delivered

Two hypothetical quotes for 500 similar 200 ml glass jars, both stated before GST and both assumed to have the same GST treatment, so GST drops out of the comparison. Neither describes a real supplier, CSI included. Every input is illustrative; replace each with your own.

Broken down per usable jar, Quote 1 is ₹55.00 of sticker, ₹2.89 of breakage write-off (jars paid for and never used), ₹5.26 of freight and ₹2.11 of admin. Quote 2 is ₹62.00 of sticker and ₹0.80 of admin. The diagram shows the same stacks to scale. Admin uses the same illustrative 12 minutes per broken jar at ₹200.00 an hour as the breakage guide.

What moves the answer

The break-even freight for Quote 1, the consignment charge at which the two land at the same cost, is about ₹1,330.00. Above it, Quote 2 wins; below it, Quote 1 does. In this example that single number matters more than a rupee or two of per-piece haggling, and it can only be answered by a real freight quote to your pin code. Replacement terms matter as much: if Quote 1 also replaced its broken jars free, Quote 1 would land ₹0.80 cheaper, even with the full ₹2,500.00 freight.

Filling in a CSI column honestly

If CSI is one of the columns in your sheet, here is what our listings tell you and what they don't. We would rather you knew the gaps than filled them with guesses in our favour.

One illustration of why line 4 matters: 500 Salsa clear jars as five 100 Pcs packs are ₹14,750.00, ₹29.50 a jar. If the freight on that consignment happened to equal the worked example's illustrative ₹2,500.00, the jars would land at ₹34.50 per jar ordered before breakage and admin. The real figure is whatever your quote says; the point is that it belongs in the sheet.

CSI lines to put through the sheet

Build your comparison sheet in seven steps

Landed cost is a per-order figure. Whether buying more at once is worth the cash it ties up is a separate question, answered in the inventory-maths guide; the checks to run before a first large order are in the first wholesale order checklist.

Landed before Diwali, 8 November 2026

Diwali falls on 8 November 2026, 43 days after these prices were checked. Landed cost has a time dimension before a festival: a quote that lands cheaper but arrives after your production day costs you the order. Put the dispatch date and a realistic transit time next to each landed figure, and discard any quote that cannot reach you with time to inspect, pour, cure and pack. CSI dispatches from Pune; ask us for a dispatch date with the quote.

Frequently asked questions