MOQ realities

Why minimums exist

The costs that do not scale are the problem. Pattern-making is the same work for one piece as for five hundred. So is sampling, so is setting up a line, so is the inspector. Spread over five hundred jackets those costs vanish. Spread over five they are most of the price.

There is a scheduling cost too. A factory running 5,000-piece orders loses more by interrupting the line for your fifty than it earns from your fifty.

What a small run actually costs a factory

At five pieces, pattern-making and setup might be $200 to $400 spread over five jackets — $40 to $80 a piece before a single hide is cut. That is the arithmetic behind most factories saying a hundred.

Our sample fee covers that pattern. $99 for a hoodie, $139 varsity, $149 leather includes the pattern-making, your artwork redrawn to production files, one finished piece and delivery. The $200 to $400 you would otherwise be quoted for a pattern is inside that number, and the fee itself comes off your first order in full.

So how can anyone take one piece?

By already being set up for it. Our line runs single pieces and small batches every day alongside the production runs, so cutting, sewing and shipping one is not an interruption to our operation — it is our operation. The setup cost is carried by work that exists anyway.

That is why we have no minimum at all. Under five pieces we charge the sample rate per piece, which is what the work costs at that quantity rather than a penalty for ordering small. At five pieces and above the band price applies, and it falls again at fifty and at two hundred.

How to tell a real minimum from a lazy one

Ask what the minimum is for. A supplier who says “fifty per style, because pattern and setup are $300 and below that you are paying more for setup than for jackets” is telling you something true. A supplier who says “100 pieces, company policy” has not thought about it, and will not think about your order either.