About 68% of wholesale aluminum bottles suppliers support mixed size orders if the total MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity) is ≥ 10,000 pieces. Let’s use a certain manufacturer in Dongguan as an example. The buyers can purchase 250ml, 500ml and 750ml specifications together. If the total order amount is up to 15,000 pieces, the unit price can be reduced by 12%, which will save 8,400 US dollars in comparison with buying separately. Once a certain craft beer brand adopted the 3:5:2 capacity ratio strategy, the loading rate of transportation containers increased by 22%, and the sea transportation cost declined from 0.15 US dollars per piece to 0.11 US dollars per piece.
The pricing strategy is affected by mold switching cost. To obtain different sizes, the stamping die needs to be replaced. It takes 3.5 hours with one switch and the power consumption increases by 180 kilowatt-hours. A factory in Zhejiang Province has launched a “size gradient package” for customers to tailor within a diameter tolerance range of ± 5mm (for example, 330ml and 350ml share molds). This reduces the mold cost of mixed batch orders by 65%, and customers with an order of at least 5,000 pieces can have a uniform price of 0.88 US dollars per piece, which is 37% lower than the expense of individually opening molds.
Optimization of logistics has unseen benefits. A particular beverage company placed a mixed order for 100ml travel-sized and 1L family-sized aluminum bottles. By using the nested structure, the container loading quantity of 40 feet has increased from 120,000 pieces to 185,000 pieces, with a freight saving per unit of 19%. Its calculation shows that under the state of being transported in mixed containers, the breakage rate of 1L bottles is only 0.2%, while under the state of being separately transported, the breakage rate caused by vibration is 1.1%, with the cost of cargo damage per year reduced by 67,000 US dollars.
The inventory strategy of the suppliers determines if mixed batch is viable. If a Shenzhen wholesale aluminum bottles manufacturer established a dynamic safety stock model, with a high-frequency size turnover of 15 days for 300ml and 500ml, and a stabilized mixed orders delivery cycle at 18 days, that will be 60% quicker than custom sizes. Its 2023 data is that the average purchase frequency of the mixed-batch customers is 5 times a year, while that of the single-size customers is only 2.3 times a year. The average order value of the former is 220% higher.
Industry cases verify the benefits of mixed batch processing. There is some organic juice brand in the United States that uses the proportion of 4:6 to mix 250ml with 750ml aluminum bottles. The efficiency of the switching of filling lines is increased by 40% (as all the bottle mouths are designed to be 28mm), and the labor cost is decreased from 0.05 US dollars per piece to 0.03 US dollars per piece. EU regulations drive innovation – According to the EN 13432 recyclable standard, mixed recycling of aluminum bottles of different sizes consumes 15% less smelting energy, enabling suppliers to offer an environmental discount of 3%.
Risk control requires quantifying the degree of dimensional dispersion. One Southeast Asian buyer saw SKU complexity increase due to the multiplication of 8 sizes, which caused the warehouse error rate to climb from 0.5% to 4.7%. Later, they introduced an RFID tag tracking system, which enhanced the sorting accuracy rate to 99.9%. However, the initial investment increased the cost per item by 0.07 US dollars. Statistics show that when the optimal mixed batch scale is 3 to 5 sizes and the size difference coefficient (standard deviation/mean) is maintained within 0.35, the decrease in operational efficiency is ≤ 8%.