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Consignment on Temu is a wholesale job wearing a marketplace login. You do not pick the price shoppers see. You submit a supply price — the per-unit rate Temu pays you when a unit sells — and Temu sets retail, runs promotions, and fulfills from its warehouse. Quote too low and you finance Temu's discounting. Quote too high and the listing never gets a commercial term you can live with.
This page is the quoting method, not another seller-onboarding walkthrough. For registration, model choice, and the side-by-side fee table, use the How to Sell on Temu guide. The formulas below turn landed cost into a walk-away floor and a marketplace-equivalent sanity check you can reproduce in the Temu Seller Fee Calculator.
What you are actually quoting
On consignment (fully-managed), Temu is the retailer. Third-party seller guides describe the supply price as a bid or a floor Temu can accept, counter, or ignore; you do not control the consumer price after inventory is inbound. That is the opposite of semi-managed / marketplace, where you set retail and Temu takes a category commission in the 8%–15% band.
Two consequences follow, and most bad quotes ignore the second:
- Your P&L is wholesale. Profit per sold unit is supply price − landed cost. Temu's retail margin is not yours to share.
- Temu's retail still bounds the negotiation. If comparable Temu listings sit near $19.99, a factory-floor quote of $9.71 implies Temu keeps about 51.4% of sticker. A planning quote closer to $15.71 — the dataset's marketplace-equivalent — implies about 21.4%. Those are different businesses.
The three-number quoting method
Do not start from “what Amazon charges” or “what I want to make on retail.” Start from cash you will spend to put a sellable unit in Temu's building, then keep two more numbers next to it.
1. Adjusted landed cost — the only honest input
Landed cost on consignment is what it costs you to deliver a unit Temu can sell, not what it costs to make one on the factory floor:
- Product cost / COGS (ex-works or after your own packaging and labels).
- Inbound freight to the Temu warehouse or designated 3PL, per unit.
-
A reserve for units you may not get paid for — QC rejects on
inbound, and refunds that third-party seller guides report Temu sometimes issues
on low-ticket orders without a physical return. That reserve is not in
temu.ts; treat it as your own assumption and replace 3% with your category's actual unpaid rate once you have settlement history.
Formula: adjusted landed = (COGS + inbound) ÷ (1 − reserve). For SKU A that is ($5.00 + $1.50) ÷ (1 − 3%) = $6.70. Duties and origin-country charges belong in COGS or inbound if you are the importer of record; if Temu is importing, do not double-count. Confirm who is importer of record in the seller agreement.
If you are a reseller rather than a manufacturer, the COGS line is the supplier invoice plus the cost of getting that stock to Temu's inbound address. Domestic wholesale catalogs such as Doba* and global fulfillment networks such as CJ Dropshipping* only help if the quoted unit cost is real and the inbound leg is in the model. A dropship invoice that ignores the warehouse appointment is not a Temu landed cost.
2. Walk-away floor — target margin on the supply price
Because you never receive Temu's retail, target margin has to sit on the supply price, not on sticker:
floor = (adjusted landed + $0.30) ÷ (1 − target margin − 2.9%)
The gross-up covers seller-paid processing that may appear on settlement (see FAQ). If Seller Center shows processing as Temu-absorbed, use adjusted landed ÷ (1 − target margin) instead. At a 25% target on SKU A, the floor is ($6.70 + $0.30) ÷ (1 − 25% − 2.9%) = $9.71. That is $2.43 per paid unit after processing and the reserve. Below this number you are funding Temu's retail. The profit calculator is the same identity if you treat supply price as “selling price” and adjusted landed as “cost.”
3. Marketplace-equivalent sanity check — do not leave the whole spread
Temu publishes no official public fee card (dataset source: Temu seller onboarding; last updated 2026-09-15). For planning, our dataset treats consignment as the typical 12% marketplace commission plus a 5% extra — 17% effective take — and still budgets 2.9% + $0.30 processing. Convert an expected Temu retail (from comparable live listings, not your Amazon or Shopify price) into a supply-price equivalent:
sanity = retail × (1 − 17%) − (retail × 2.9% + $0.30)
On a $19.99 expected retail that is $15.71. The calculator uses the same identity when you switch the selling model to consignment at the typical 12% rate — it adds the 5% extra automatically. If Seller Center later shows processing as Temu-absorbed on your account, drop the processing term and re-run; the article keeps it so the sanity check matches the published calculator.
Worked quotes: one SKU, four asks
Same product, four ways to fill the supply-price field. The first three are your margin policy on adjusted landed. The fourth is the dataset sanity check against $19.99 expected retail. None of these is an official Temu rate card.
SKU A · $19.99 expected retail · $6.70 adjusted landed
| Quote policy | Supply price | Profit / paid unit | Implied Temu take |
|---|---|---|---|
| Healthy floor (25% on supply) | $9.71 | $2.43 | 51.4% |
| Repeat-volume ask (15% on supply) | $8.53 | $1.28 | 57.3% |
| Thin floor (10% on supply) | $8.04 | $0.80 | 59.8% |
| Marketplace-equivalent sanity (17% + processing) | $15.71 | $8.26 | 21.4% |
Implied Temu take = (expected retail − supply price) ÷ expected retail. It is Temu's retail spread, not a billed commission. If live comparables retail closer to $9.99 than $19.99, recompute the sanity column; do not reuse $15.71.
How to use the table: never submit below the healthy floor unless you have explicitly accepted a thinner margin. Open nearer the sanity check when comparable Temu listings support $19.99. If Temu counters toward $8.53 or $8.04, you are choosing a volume bet, not discovering a hidden official rate. Volume-break quotes (first container vs repeat 5,000-unit lots) are a seller-side presentation — Temu has not published a public volume card we can cite.
When the floor is above the sanity check, walk away
The method also tells you which SKUs should never go on consignment. Two tighter products, same 3% reserve and 25% floor:
Same method, two more SKUs · walk-away vs sanity
| SKU | Expected retail | Adjusted landed | 25% floor | Sanity check | Call |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| B · viable but tight | $9.99 | $5.36 | $7.85 | $7.70 | Floor sits under sanity. Quote the band; little room to concede. |
| C · do not consign | $9.99 | $7.73 | $11.14 | $7.70 | Floor is above both sanity and retail. Consignment cannot clear 25%. |
SKU B inputs: $4.00 COGS + $1.20 inbound. SKU C inputs: $6.00 COGS + $1.50 inbound. SKU C's floor ($11.14) exceeds expected retail ($9.99) — no supply price exists that both pays you 25% and fits Temu's likely sticker.
SKU C is the usual reseller failure mode: a $6.00 invoice against a sub-$9.99 Temu retail. Semi-managed will not save it either once 12% commission and 2.9% + $0.30 processing land on the same sticker. Run the SKU in the fee calculator on both models before you book a warehouse appointment. Eligibility and paperwork differences live in the Temu seller requirements guide; if you are choosing platforms rather than quotes, see Temu vs AliExpress for sellers.
How to submit the number in Seller Center
Temu does not publish a public “paste this supply price” form that we can cite as a stable URL — seller-onboarding currently resolves to the consumer storefront, and commercial terms sit behind Seller Center. Third-party onboarding write-ups converge on the same sequence: product file, samples where asked, a per-unit supply price, and a volume story. Prepare the packet as if you are quoting a retailer, because you are.
- Lead with the ask, show the floor only if asked. Opening at $15.71 on SKU A and conceding toward $9.71 is a negotiation. Opening at $9.71 trains Temu that the floor is the ask.
- Attach a cost build, not a wish. COGS, inbound, pack-out, and the reserve rate belong in the worksheet you keep even if the submission UI only accepts one number.
- State capacity and MOQ in units, not adjectives. Weekly output, first inbound quantity, and replenishment lead time are what a buying team can use. “We can scale” is not a term.
- Confirm the signed supply price before you ship. A verbal or dashboard suggestion is not a settlement term. If the accepted number is below your floor, do not inbound “to test” — consigned stock is priced after it leaves your dock.
After the first payout cycle, replace the 3% reserve and the expected retail with your actual unpaid-unit rate and the live Temu sticker. Re-quote replenishment from those two facts, not from this page's scenario table.
Frequently asked questions
What is a Temu supply price on consignment?
On Temu consignment (fully-managed), you do not set the customer-facing retail price. You submit a per-unit supply price — the wholesale rate Temu pays you when a unit sells — and Temu sets retail, promotions, fulfillment, and customer service. Your profit is supply price minus landed cost, not a share of the sticker price.
How do I calculate the minimum Temu supply price I can quote?
Add product cost and inbound freight to Temu's warehouse, then divide by (1 − expected unpaid-unit rate) so refunds and QC rejects do not erase the quote. Gross up for seller-paid processing: (adjusted landed + $0.30) ÷ (1 − target margin − 2.9%). In the worked example, $5.00 COGS + $1.50 inbound, a 3% reserve, and a 25% target becomes $9.71. If Seller Center shows processing as Temu-absorbed, drop the processing terms. That number is your walk-away floor, not the ask.
Does Temu charge a commission on consignment sales?
Temu publishes no official public fee card. Consignment payouts are a negotiated supply price, so you typically do not see a separate referral line. For planning, our dataset still uses a 12% typical marketplace commission plus a 5% consignment extra (17% combined) and 2.9% + $0.30 processing against an expected retail, so you can compare a quote to marketplace-equivalent economics. Confirm settlement terms in Seller Center — verify in your seller dashboard.
Should I quote only my factory floor, or closer to marketplace-equivalent?
Quote a band, not a single number. The floor is the lowest supply price that still hits your target margin after landed cost and a reserve. The sanity check converts an expected Temu retail through the dataset's 17% effective take plus processing — $15.71 on a $19.99 retail in the example. Asking only the floor leaves Temu the entire retail spread; asking above the sanity check is likelier to be pushed back. Negotiate inside the band and confirm the signed terms before you inbound.
Do I include payment processing in a Temu supply-price quote?
Some third-party guides say Temu absorbs processing on consignment; our dataset still budgets 2.9% + $0.30 on both models so a side-by-side comparison does not hide a line that may appear on settlement. If Seller Center shows processing as Temu-absorbed on your account, drop that line from the sanity check. Verify in your seller dashboard.
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