Writing a Reseller Price List

A price list is a policy document

Resellers read a price list as a menu; it is written as a policy. Every dispute that starts with "but the other store" traces to a line the list omitted. This page sets out the structure of a reseller price list for a small accessories range and the lines worth adding before the first dispute.

Structure per SKU

• SKU code and full model name, exactly as printed on the box.
• Short specification line: band list, laser, display, mounting, power.
• Price tiers by quantity, with the breakpoints stated in units.
• Minimum order per SKU and per order.
• Packing: units per carton, carton weight and dimensions.

The specification line does double duty: it informs the buyer and it pins the list to a documented configuration, so a specification change is a new line rather than a surprise.

Validity and review

State the validity window and the review date. Component and freight costs move; a list without a window is a list of promises. State what triggers a revision: material cost, freight, or currency, and how much notice resellers get before new prices apply. Resellers plan promotions against your list; notice is what makes the list usable rather than merely correct.

Terms lines that prevent disputes

• Payment terms and the split by order size.
• Trade term and named place for delivery.
• Freight basis: who arranges, who pays, and how it is quoted.
• Lead time basis, and the latest-order date for seasonal stock.
• Warranty basis in one line, referencing the full written terms.
• Minimum advertised price policy, if you run one, and how it is enforced.

The advertising policy line is the one small brands most often skip and most often need. State plainly what prices resellers may advertise, where, and what happens on a breach. Enforce it consistently or remove it; a policy applied to one reseller and not another is a discount program in disguise.

Map and territory

State the territory the list applies to, and how requests outside it are handled. Where resellers sell online across borders, say whether online sales are inside or outside the territory. Ambiguity here grows into the kind of dispute that ends relationships over amounts smaller than the legal fees.

Format and updates

Keep the list to one or two pages, in a format a buyer can open anywhere. Date every version and version-number it; "the list" must mean exactly one document at any time. Announce revisions to all resellers at once, with the effective date, rather than letting each learn individually. The list is also a trust signal: a clean, dated, complete list reads as a brand that manages its channel, and buyers extend that reading to the product.

Pricing the list's own maintenance

A price list is a living document, and its maintenance deserves an owner and a rhythm: revisions drafted quarterly, effective dates announced with notice, and a changelog line per revision so resellers can see what moved. The changelog is also the brand's own memory of the market: freight lines that moved twice in a year are a freight story, material lines that moved are a component story, and the patterns write next year's negotiation brief. Lists without owners rot into exceptions; lists with owners become the channel's most-referenced page, which is exactly the influence a small brand wants its pricing to carry.

Tier structure that survives contact

Price tiers work when the breakpoints are quantities a reseller can actually plan around: case packs, quarter pallets, seasonal buys. Tiers invented from a margin table, with breakpoints nobody's warehouse holds, get rounded by the market until the tier structure is fiction. Ask two resellers what quantities they buy in before setting the tiers, and put the case pack on the list beside each tier so the arithmetic is visible. Where a tier requires a mixed order across SKUs, say so on the list; a mixed tier is the single most useful line a small brand can offer a new reseller, because it lowers the first order's risk without discounting the shelf price.

The new-reseller path

Every price list implies an onboarding path, and writing it down prevents the ad-hoc deals that leak margin. The path usually reads: sample order at list, first stock order at tier one, review at ninety days against sell-through, tier movement on evidence. State what documentation moves a reseller up or down: sales data, shelf photographs, the marketing commitments both sides agreed. A path on the list converts the conversation from "what discount can I get" to "how do we get to the next tier," which is the conversation a brand wants its channel having.

Keeping the list out of the exceptions file

The death of a price list is the exception: the deal agreed by email that the list never contained. Exceptions are sometimes right, but they belong in the list as a named program or in the bin. Review the exceptions file each quarter: any exception that recurs twice becomes a program with a name, stated terms and an owner, and any exception that cannot be justified becomes a closed conversation. The list that absorbs its exceptions stays one document; the list that accumulates them quietly becomes a memory test, and memory always settles at the reseller's favor.

The list's companion documents

The price list travels with two companions that prevent most of its disputes: a one-page terms summary, which is the list's clauses in plain sentences, and the current imagery pack, so resellers present the product the same way the brand does. Bundle all three under one version number and date, and distribute updates together. Resellers build their pages from whatever arrives; a brand that ships a coherent set gets a coherent channel, and coherence is what the end customer reads as a brand rather than as a reseller's guess.