Cheap per kilo, expensive per sheet: how to price plastic properly

Almost every week a customer tells us our price is higher than the quote next door. Our first question is always the same: higher per kilo, or higher per sheet?

Those two often point in opposite directions, and that is where businesses quietly lose money.

Plastic is sold by the kilo, used by the sheet

Factories sell in kilograms. But your cashier, or your warehouse operator, uses them one at a time. What drives your daily cost is not the price per kilo - it is how many sheets you get from that kilo, and how many of them survive to the end of the job.

Three steps to work it out

• Weigh one pack of the bags you buy today and count what is inside. Divide the pack price by the number of sheets. That is your cost per sheet.
• Do the same for the competing quote. Make sure the bag size is identical, otherwise the comparison does not hold.
• Add the waste. If 8 out of 100 sheets tear and get thrown away, your real cost rises by about 8 percent.

Why cheap resin usually yields fewer sheets

Blends with a high recycled content are typically heavier for the same strength, so a kilogram runs out faster because each sheet consumes more material. Their strength is also uneven, which means more sheets tearing mid-use.

The result: a lower price per kilo, but a higher cost per usable sheet.

What to ask your supplier

• What is the gauge of this bag in millimetres, not just thin or thick?
• Roughly how many sheets per kilogram at this size?
• Is the gauge identical on every delivery, and how is that maintained?

If a supplier cannot answer all three with numbers, the specification is not being controlled.

We are happy to do the maths with you

Send us a sample of the bag you use today along with what you pay for it. We will work out your cost per sheet and compare it with the specification we would recommend - free, with no obligation to buy.