RU Seller — B2B services Russia–China

All articles

Calculations

The minimum-price calculator: how to price and stay out of the red

A price is not summed up from costs — it is derived from an equation. What goes into the calculation, why the commission cannot simply be added, and how to use it.

天津凌途进出口有限公司 · Tianjin Lingtu Import & Export Co., Ltd. · 91120222MA82MR2U5G

The most common pricing mistake looks harmless: add up the purchase, the logistics and the commission, add the profit you want, and call that the price. It does not work, because the commission is a percentage of the very price you are looking for. Add it to the costs and you understate the price, losing the difference on every sale.

An equation instead of a sum

The correct statement is: price minus commission equals total costs. From which the price equals the costs divided by one minus the commission rate. At a 20 % commission and 213 ¥ of costs the break-even price is 213 ÷ 0.8 = 266.25 ¥, not 213 + 20 % = 255.6.

What the costs include

  • The purchase of the goods — on every shipment, not on every sale.
  • China-to-Russia logistics at the chosen warehouse’s rate, with the weight rounded up to a hundred grams.
  • Other per-unit costs: card acquiring, packaging, delivery to the warehouse in China.
  • Handling of refusals — by the number of refusals, not shipments.
  • And what comes back: the value recovered from a cancelled order is subtracted from the purchase.

Two answers instead of one

The calculator returns two prices. The first is break-even: below it you lose money on the item. The second is the price with your profit percentage on cost. Everything between them is room to manoeuvre: discounts, promotions, taking part in sales. Knowing the floor matters more than knowing the “right” price, because discount decisions get made fast and by eye.

Why calculate it here

The shipping rate, the commission for your item and the return tariff do not have to be hunted down and typed in: they come from the same data we collect from the platform every day. You pick the warehouse and the item. The yuan-to-rouble rate is filled in too — the official Central Bank rate, with its date beside the figure. Assembling rates from a PDF, a commission from the account and a rate from somewhere else into one table is half an hour of work, and it has to be repeated every time something changes.

04

Free store review

Send a link to your store or to a couple of products. We will look at the cards, the reviews, the price against competitors and the delivery maths, and write back with what is holding sales down.

The review is free and commits you to nothing.

We reply within one working day. If email suits you better — info@ruseller.cn

The details go only to our mailbox and are not passed to third parties.