Small orders lose money more often than people realize
A single small item can look profitable when you only count its material cost, but setup time, an often-overlooked fixed cost of preparing and monitoring any job regardless of size, does not shrink for a smaller order. A shop that consistently underprices small jobs is quietly losing money on a category of work it may not even realize is unprofitable. This tool computes a hard floor from every real cost component, so you know exactly what a "yes" needs to cover before you say it.
How the floor is computed
Setup, labor, and material costs are summed first as the base cost. A failure allowance percentage inflates that base to account for jobs that do not succeed on the first attempt. Your desired return percentage is then applied as a true margin (a percentage of the final price, not just markup on cost), giving a floor below which the order actively loses money or return.
Worked example
$5 setup, $4 labor, $2.50 material, 10% failure allowance, 20% desired return: the base cost of $11.50 becomes $12.65 after the failure allowance, and dividing by (1 - 0.20) gives a price floor of $15.81, the number below which this specific order should not be accepted if the desired return actually matters.
A common mistake
A frequent error is underestimating setup cost by only counting the time actually spent slicing and starting the print, forgetting the time spent messaging the customer, preparing the file, and monitoring the job. Track your real time on a few small orders before settling on a setup-cost figure; the honest number is usually higher than the first guess.
Limitations
This computes a cost-based floor from the components you enter; it does not know your competitive market rate or what a customer will actually pay. Use it to avoid accepting a loss, not as your target price; the Quote Price Planner builds the full customer-facing price from a similar cost basis.