Consignment Split Calculator

One number decides it

Consignment and an outright offer differ in more than price: consignment pays later, and only if the item sells. But the arithmetic reduces to a single comparison — the sale price at which the consignment payout equals the cash in hand.

That break-even is the outright offer divided by one minus the commission rate. A £150 offer against a 40% commission breaks even at £250: below that the cash wins, above it consignment does.

Commission rates commonly run 40 to 60% for general resale, and tiers usually favour higher-value items, so an expensive piece keeps a larger share. That is the opposite direction to most marketplace fees.

A worked example

A shop offers £150 outright, or will consign at 40%. If the item sells for £300 the payout is £180 — £30 better than the cash. If it sells for £220 the payout is £132, worse than the offer, and it took three months to find out.

The break-even is £250. Whether to consign therefore reduces to a single judgement: is this item likely to sell above £250? Everything else is noise.

Where the answer misleads

Time has value and the arithmetic ignores it. Sixty to ninety days of waiting, with the possibility of the item returning unsold at the end of its season, is a real cost against cash today — particularly for a reseller whose capital is tied up in stock.

The terms after that window matter more than the commission rate. Some shops mark down automatically, some return the item, some donate it. A 50% commission with the item returned in good condition can be a better deal than 40% with an automatic markdown to clearance.

Finally, the expected sale price is the assumption doing all the work, and consignors are optimistic about it. Anchor it to completed sales of comparable items, not to what the shop suggests it might fetch.