I will be using my figures for this soap making cost calculator. Some cost calculators get complicated with rent and power bills, but I won’t. I was the number cruncher at my store, I would figure out things to the tablespoon, if need be. I also had to figure out the cost per bar when we were going to hire an employee. To do that, I had to time myself doing various tasks. I was surprised at the ending mathematical result.
This soap making cost calculator will start with the cost of each bar I made:
The costs for each soap were calculated with the shipping costs added. When I tried to calculate the actual cost of say, an essential oil, shipping costs would have to be included. There did seem to be a pattern where shipping was often approximately 15% of the order. So for simplicity, we added 15% to the cost of everything, whether it actually cost more, or was delivered for free. And generally, I bought in bulk, being 40-50 lb containers of oils, and liters of essential oils and fragrance oils.
- Anise $0.47
- Blackberry Orange $0.79
- Bug Repellent $0.60
- Chocolate Chai $0.41
- Lavender $0.67
- Lemon-Berry $0.95
- Lemongrass $0.47
- Lemongrass & Rosemary $0.46
- Lemon-Lime $0.61
- Life’s a Beach $0.56
- Lilac $0.60
- Oatmeal Orange $0.50
- Patchouli $1.08
- Rosemary $0.45
- Sandalwood $0.39
- Strawberry Patch $0.80
- Tea Tree $0.51
- Vanilla $0.63
- Unscented $0.27
What about your time?
I wouldn’t quit my day job quite yet. I decided to time myself doing the various soap making tasks, then take that time factor and divide that by minimum wage. All to get the cost of labor per bar.
The activities I timed were: (time ./. wage = per bar)
- labeling each bar $0.13
- 5 hours of making 270 bars of soap and clean up $0.15
- label cost (paper, ink, tape) $0.10
- rotating, cutting, rotation and organizing of curing bars $0.10
- misc, ordering, errands $0.10
So the soap making cost calculator put all together:
- average cost of each bar (from $0.30 to $1.00) $0.59
- average cost of labor of each bar $0.58
- TOTAL AVERAGE PER BAR $1.17
Don’t forget friends and family for cheap labor, lol. I used my kids to package up little samples into tiny little baggies. One kid was slacking off, so we did it 5 cents per sample bagged – then it was fair. The customers loved these little samples!
Get the list of the best essential oils soap making here, containing my list of liter-sized scents with a maximum cost of $100 per bottle.
My favorite supplier to order from, FPI, they do deal in bulk supplies, but the prices are great!
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