The same product, made in the same industrial cluster in China, can arrive on a commercial project quotation at very different prices — and the difference is usually not the product. It is the pricing structure of the route it traveled. There are two basic structures: a package price, where a seller combines goods, margins and services into one non-itemized number; and factory price plus commission, where goods are invoiced at documented factory prices and the buyer’s agent charges a disclosed fee on top — at FBM Sourcing, 5–8% depending on order value. Understanding what sits inside each number is the single most useful piece of commercial literacy a project buyer can bring to China.
What Is Inside a Package Price?
A package price from a full-range supplier typically stacks three layers into one figure:
- Manufacturing margin — on the one or two categories where the seller genuinely owns a production line;
- Resale margin — on every category it buys from other factories to complete the range, which, given how specialized Chinese factories are, is most of a full project package;
- Service premium — showroom, design work (often presented as free), sales staff and coordination, recovered through the goods price.
None of the three layers appears as a line on the quotation. That is not an accounting trick unique to China — it is how retail pricing works everywhere. But it has a practical consequence for a project buyer: the number cannot be decomposed, so it cannot be audited.
What Is Inside Factory Price Plus Commission?
Under the agent structure, the quotation is built the other way around. Each BOQ line carries the price quoted by the specialized factory that will actually manufacture it — obtained in competition with other factories making the same category — and the agent’s remuneration sits on top as a stated percentage. FBM Sourcing charges a 5–8% commission and issues the quotations, invoices and shipping documents itself, so the client deals with one accountable party while every goods line remains mapped to a factory price. Nothing is bundled; nothing is hidden. What a sourcing agent’s fee covers — and does not — is public on this site.
Why Can’t a Package Price Be Audited?
Mechanically, because there is no line mapping: the quotation does not say which factory made what, or what each item cost before margin. Structurally, because itemization would expose the layers — a bundled price is only sustainable as a bundle. Free design plays a role here too: once the design and specification sit in the seller’s format, built around the seller’s range, taking the package apart to price it elsewhere means re-specifying the project from scratch. Again, none of this is misconduct; it is a coherent retail model. It is simply the opposite of what a quantity surveyor or project accountant means by a checkable quotation.
Want a quotation you can actually audit?
FBM Sourcing works with project owners, developers, main contractors and FF&E contractors on hotel, apartment, school, office and other commercial building projects. Send us your BOQ, drawings or product list — every line comes back mapped to a documented factory price, with our 5–8% commission stated on top.
Why Do the Two Routes Diverge on Price?
Because of supply-chain specialization. A full-range seller must go outside its own production lines for most of a project package, and each bought-in category carries a resale layer before it reaches the package price. A buyer-side sourcing agent starts at the specialized factory for every category — the plant that actually runs the production line — and puts competing factories against each other before anything is priced. The more categories a project spans, and the more custom the work, the more room there is between the two structures. On single showroom items the difference can be small; across a 200-line commercial BOQ it compounds.
Where Can the Package Route Hold Its Own?
To be fair to the model: on the specific category a supplier genuinely manufactures, its pricing can be close to factory level — it is the factory for that line. A buyer sourcing mainly ceramic tiles from a company that owns tile lines, for example, is much closer to factory pricing than the same buyer taking that company’s full-house package. The practical takeaway is not “never buy a package”; it is know which lines are manufactured and which are traded before you read the number — the theme of what a one-stop supplier actually manufactures and of the wider sourcing agent vs one-stop supplier comparison.
What Should a Commercial Buyer Do With Any China Quotation?
Ask the structure question before the discount question. A discount off an unauditable number is still an unauditable number. A commercial procurement process — the kind a lender, quantity surveyor or owner’s board will accept — needs prices that map to a BOQ line by line, specifications checked against drawings, and inspection records that follow the goods. That is the working definition of buying through a China sourcing partner rather than from a catalog, and it is how FBM Sourcing manages the entire China procurement package for overseas construction projects.
If you want to see the difference on your own project, the test costs nothing: send the BOQ and compare the two quotations you get back — one number, or numbers you can check.
