Pricing for materials

[Former_Member]

I was wanting to know how some of you set your prices for materials you used in a piece. For example: say I'm selling a necklace that uses 12 glass pearls; when I bought them it came in a pack of 25 that cost me $5.00. Do I charge the full $5 although I only used 12 glass pearls for my necklace or do I charge for only using 12?
Thanks

[Former_Member]

If you use 12 in a piece, you charge for 12.

[Former_Member]

What Gena said.

[Former_Member]

I would only charge for what I use, but remembering that materials are only a part of the pricing formula.
This is a great article on the Etsy Blog, plus DEFINITELY watch the pricing for profit online labs.
http://www.etsy.com/blog/en/2012/a-simple-formula-for-pricing-your-work/

[Etchddreams]

Well not sure that answer you are looking for.. If you only use 12 the cost would be like $2.40 but that is just your cost. You have to figure in total cost of everything used plus labor and markup. So you have to figure you markup on items you have to buy to make each item. Hope this makes sense..

[Former_Member]

Thanks for the replies. I actually did read that blog post and watched the video twice : D I was mainly looking for how to price something like that. But that makes sense now. Thanks you guys.

[Former_Member]

So to play Devil's advocate, if someone wants a custom order and you have the buy the entire pack of beads, then shouldn't your price cover your losses? What if you are unable to use the other half of the package?

I do a lot of custom orders for other things and, if I need 1 yard of material, they pay for 1 yard of material. If I can get other things cut from the scraps, that's a gain for me but I don't charge less for the custom order because of it.

[Former_Member]

Actually...Etched Dreams,is there a formula that you use to find out the price. I'm not exactly sure how to calculate that (￣Д￣)ﾉ

[Former_Member]

I don't understand Etsy's pricing formula. If I did what they recommend, I would be charging over $80 for my handspun wool baby hats. o_O
Sooo... what I do is calculate the cost of all my materials for each piece, then multiply X3.

[Former_Member]

That's a good point Nicole. Thanks. : )

[PiecesofMeCardsnMore]

My other shop sells jewelry but I haven't listed in a long time (jewelry was a passing phase). When I bought a pack of beads I figured out cost per bead, then wrote it down so I had that info for pricing my items.

[HoosiermammaV]

Perhaps: materials x 3 PLUS your hourly rate.

[Former_Member]

Etched Dreams from Etchddreams says
Well not sure that answer you are looking for.. If you only use 12 the cost would be like $2.40 but that is just your cost. You have to figure in total cost of everything used plus labor and markup. So you have to figure you markup on items you have to buy to make each item. Hope this makes sense..

************************************************************
The "formula" for this is: There are 25 beads in a pack for $5. 5.00/25 = $0.20/bead. You used 12 beads, so 12*$.20 = $2.40

[Former_Member]

Thank you guys : D
and thanks for the formula, Angie!!