What does each order really leave me?
Last updated
Per order, from your price list and supplier invoices.
Display only. Your figures are read in the currency you pick — nothing is converted and no exchange rate is applied.
Before any discount.
Optional. The typical share taken off by codes and sales.
What the products in the order cost you, landed.
Optional, but this is where contribution margin differs from gross margin.
Postage you absorb, or the part you do not charge for.
Boxes, inserts and pick-and-pack.
From your statement.
The flat part, if any.
Optional. Rent, wages and subscriptions, to see how many orders cover them.
Costs that do not change with the number of orders.
Enter what the order is listed at and what the goods in it cost you. Then add the costs that come with every order, such as the shipping you pay and the payment fee, to see what the order really leaves.
- List priceNeeded
- Cost of goodsNeeded
- Shipping, packaging and payment feeOptional
- Fixed costs a monthOptional
No preset fee or cost is used: every figure is yours. For units, sales and a profit target on top of this, use the break-even point calculator; to compare plans and their processing rates, use the Shopify fees calculator.
Nothing you type is sent anywhere. There is no account, no install and no store connection.
Price, discount and the costs that ride along with every order
Contribution margin is the part of an order that is left once the goods, the shipping you pay, the packaging and the payment fee have come out of it, so an imaginary hoodie brand selling at 68 dollars with a 10 percent average discount keeps 27.83 dollars of each 61.20 dollar order, a contribution margin of 45.5 percent.
No fee rate is preset: every cost is yours. For units, sales and a profit target, use the break-even point calculator; to see what a discount does to the whole order book, use the discount impact calculator.
Everything here is per order and comes from your own invoices: supplier bills, carrier bills and payment statements. Leave rent, wages and subscriptions out; they come in only at the end, as fixed costs.
- Price and average discount
- The listed price of the order and the average percentage knocked off it by codes and sales. The discount matters: every other cost stays the same when the price the shopper pays goes down.
- Cost of goods
- What the products in the order cost you to buy or make, landed at your door, including inbound freight and duties if you pay them.
- Shipping you pay
- The postage you absorb on an order. If the shopper pays shipping in full, leave it blank; if you charge less than it costs, enter the difference you cover.
- Packaging and handling
- Boxes, mailers, tissue, inserts, and the pick and pack fee if a warehouse does it for you.
- Payment fee
- The percentage and the fixed amount your payment provider takes on each order, read from your own statement. The percentage applies to what the shopper actually paid.
- Contribution and contribution margin
- The money an order leaves toward rent, wages, ads and profit, and that amount as a share of what the shopper paid. The breakdown shows which cost takes the biggest bite.
- Fixed costs a month
- Optional. Add them to see how many orders a month it takes to cover them at this contribution. For units, revenue and a profit target, use the break-even point calculator.
Nudgesmart is available on the Shopify App Store. Browse the template library or see what it costs.
Contribution per order at five imaginary shops
Made-up orders in US dollars. The payment fee rates are what each imaginary shop typed in, not a quoted rate from any provider. The table is produced by the code behind the calculator above.
| Scenario | Shopper pays | Order costs | Contribution | Margin | Orders to cover fixed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hoodie brand, free shipping | $61.20 | $33.37 | $27.83 | 45.5% | 216 |
| Skincare set, no discount | $54.00 | $21.07 | $32.93 | 61.0% | 274 |
| Hot sauce three-pack | $23.80 | $21.91 | $1.89 | 7.9% | — |
| Desk lamp, heavy parcel | $120.00 | $79.30 | $40.70 | 33.9% | 295 |
| Phone strap, deep sale | $10.80 | $10.01 | $0.79 | 7.3% | — |
Costs a per-order margin can miss
Parcels that boomerang
When a customer sends something back, the refund reverses the sale while the outbound postage, the return label and the restocking labour stay spent. A category with frequent returns should fold that leakage into the per-order inputs.
Acquisition eats the same slice
Where most first purchases arrive through advertising, what it took to win that buyer is paid out of this very amount, well before rent or salaries see any of it. A comfortable-looking figure may already be committed twice.
Bestsellers and bargain bins disagree
Multi-item baskets and a catalogue mixing budget and luxury lines produce very different results. Check your hero product and your most heavily reduced one on their own.
Heavy or bulky items skew the postage
Couriers charge by weight, dimensions and destination zone, so one blended postage figure can conceal an awkward item that quietly loses money on every dispatch.
Statements over brochures
Foreign cards, conversion charges and disputes often lift the real processing charge above the advertised one. Read the percentage off a recent payout statement.
Contribution margin questions
How do I calculate contribution margin per order?
Enter the price, any average discount, the cost of the goods, and the per-order costs that come with a sale: shipping you pay, packaging and the payment fee. The calculator returns what each order leaves and that amount as a share of what the shopper paid. The hoodie brand above keeps 27.83 dollars of a 61.20 dollar order.
What is the difference between contribution margin and gross margin?
Gross margin usually counts only the cost of the goods. Contribution margin also takes out the costs that come with every order, such as shipping and payment fees, so it is lower and closer to what an order really leaves.
Why does the discount change so much?
Because the goods, the postage and the packaging cost the same whatever the shopper pays. Taking money off the price comes straight out of the contribution, which is why a deep sale can leave an order earning almost nothing.
What does a negative contribution mean?
That every order costs more to fulfil than the shopper pays. More orders make the loss bigger. Raise the price, cut the discount, or charge for shipping before spending on growth.
Where do the payment fee figures come from?
From you. There are no preset rates on this page and no provider is assumed. Open a recent payout statement, note the percentage and the flat charge per transaction, and type both in.
How many orders cover my overheads?
Type your monthly overheads into the optional field and the result includes the order count that clears them. For sales figures and a profit goal on top, move on to the break-even point calculator.
Postage and packaging do not double when a second item goes in the box.
Cart value is one of the 147 targeting conditions in Nudgesmart, so an offer for the next item can appear to shoppers whose cart sits below a level you choose.
