Seller pricing
Build a 3D printing job cost and seller quote
A seller quote becomes inspectable when material, energy, machine time, labor, packaging, fees, and profit remain visible.
Keep the material budget and seller quote separate
The inventory planner answers a physical purchasing question: how many grams the batch consumes, how much compatible filament is already available, and how many whole spools must be bought. A seller quote answers a different question: what price recovers the production resources and the chosen business policy.
Carry the material family, batch quantity, consumed grams, and material value into the quote. Do not replace the material value with the cash spent on whole spools. A batch can consume valuable on-hand filament while requiring no new cash purchase, and that material still belongs in the job cost.
Build the production cost from visible inputs
Use total slicer print time for the quoted batch. Electricity is print hours multiplied by average printer power and the entered energy rate. The machine-hour allowance remains separate from electricity so printer occupancy, maintenance, and replacement planning do not disappear inside the power calculation.
Separate setup labor from per-part post-processing. Setup belongs to the job once; removal, cleanup, inspection, and finishing often scale with quantity. Multiplying the per-part minutes by the batch count keeps that difference visible.
Apply failure allowance to repeatable production exposure
The failure provision applies to material value, electricity, and machine time because those inputs can recur when a print must be repeated. Packaging is added after this provision because it belongs to the completed order. This produces the cost basis before final-price platform and profit shares.
Recover fees and profit from the final price
When a platform fee is a percentage of the price paid by the customer, adding that percentage directly to cost will under-recover the fee. The same issue applies when target profit is defined as a share of the final price.
The worksheet divides the cost basis by the portion of the final price retained after the entered platform-fee and target-profit shares. The result is then split back into cost basis, platform fee, and target profit so the final quote can be checked as an identity.
Save the assumptions with the result
Two quotes can have the same total while relying on very different material, labor, failure, and margin assumptions. Save deliberate quote versions on the current device and copy the structured brief with the price. After production, compare actual material use, print hours, and hands-on time with the saved version; that comparison is what improves the next quote.