Landed cost: the unit price is usually the small number.

1. Volume usually decides the bill, not weight

Freight is charged on whichever is greater: actual weight, or volume converted into a billable weight. For most consumer goods sourced from China — anything light and bulky, anything with air inside it, anything in a retail box — volume wins, and the number that matters is cubic metres.

Work in CBM from the start. Carton dimensions multiplied together give the volume of one carton; multiply by carton count for the shipment. Ask for the carton dimensions and the units per carton at quotation time, not after you place the order, because packing choices you never see can change your freight bill more than the unit price you negotiated.

This is also where a product decision hides. If the item nests, flat-packs, or ships without a bulky retail box, that is a freight saving on every unit forever, and it is far easier to arrange before tooling exists than after.

2. The fixed costs a small shipment cannot spread

Sea freight for a part-container shipment carries a set of charges that barely move with size: origin handling, documentation, destination terminal handling, customs entry, and often a minimum chargeable volume regardless of what you actually ship. On a small first order these fixed costs can rival the freight itself, which is why the per-unit shipping cost of a trial order is a bad predictor of anything.

Two consequences. Compare quotes on total landed cost for the actual shipment rather than on a rate per CBM, because the rate is the part that looks competitive and the fixed costs are the part that decides. And when you model the real order later, do the arithmetic again at that size instead of scaling the trial.

3. Duty, and who the importer actually is

Duty is charged on a classification of your product, not on its name, and the classification code drives the rate. Get the code agreed early, in writing, and sanity-check it yourself rather than accepting whatever the supplier writes on the invoice — an optimistic code on the paperwork is your problem at the border, not theirs. Some origins and product categories also attract additional trade measures on top of the base rate, which can dwarf it.

The more important question is who is the importer of record. That is the party legally responsible for the declaration, the duty, and for the product meeting the destination market's requirements. If a supplier or forwarder offers an all-in delivered price, ask explicitly who the importer of record is and what happens if the authorities disagree with the declaration. A delivered price that quietly makes you the importer has not removed the risk, only the visibility.

Product compliance rides along with that: safety marking, technical documentation, labelling and, in some markets, a named local responsible party. It is not freight, but it lands on the same person, and it is far cheaper to establish before production than at a border.

4. The delivery-side fees nobody quotes

The costs that most often surprise a first importer are at the very end, in the destination country, and are rarely in the original quote:

• Customs brokerage and entry filing, plus any advance-filing requirement your route has — and penalties for filing late or wrong.
• Port and terminal charges, and storage if the container is not cleared quickly. Demurrage accrues daily and gets expensive fast.
• Final-mile realities: a lorry with no tail lift cannot unload a pallet at a location with no dock. Tail lift, delivery appointment, residential delivery and limited-access surcharges are all normal line items.
• Handling on receipt — whoever breaks down the pallets, checks quantities and stores the goods is a real cost even when it is you.

5. Low-value import schemes and their cliff

Several markets run simplified schemes for low-value consignments sold to consumers, where the seller registers and charges local tax at checkout so small parcels clear without a separate import process. They genuinely simplify the common case, and they all share two traps.

The first is the cliff. Each scheme has a value ceiling per consignment, and a shipment over it falls out into an ordinary import with a customs entry and a clearance fee — so combining several items into one parcel, which looks like a saving, can cost more than shipping them separately. The second is that these schemes are about consumer sales and consignment value, not about your bulk import. Your inbound shipment from the factory is a normal commercial import regardless.

One more distinction worth holding on to: a forwarder quoting you a delivered price is not the same thing as being registered under one of these schemes, and the two are frequently conflated in sales conversations. Ask which one is actually being offered.

6. The three numbers to demand from each quote

Whether you are choosing between a China-side consolidator and a domestic warehouse, or just comparing forwarders, the comparison only works if every quote answers the same three questions:

1. The fixed cost per shipment, independent of size — everything you pay to move one consignment at all.
2. The variable cost per unit or per CBM, at your actual volume.
3. The per-order handling cost at the far end, including packing and the fee charged for a return.

With those three you can find the crossover volume where one option becomes cheaper than the other, which is the actual decision. Without them you are comparing headline rates, which are chosen to be comparable rather than to be true.

On returns specifically: a return that has to travel back to China is usually not economically restockable, so a low-volume seller should assume returned goods are written off. That assumption changes which option wins more often than freight rates do.

What none of this prevents

A landed-cost model is an estimate built on classifications, rates and thresholds that change, sometimes at short notice and sometimes retroactively in effect. Building the model does not fix the number; it tells you which assumptions the number depends on, so you find out early which one moved.

Nothing here is customs, tax or legal advice, and none of it is specific to your product or country. Confirm classification and duty with a licensed broker in your destination market, and confirm current thresholds with the relevant authority rather than with a supplier or a forwarder selling you a service.