A quotation is only as good as the enquiry behind it. When two suppliers quote wildly different numbers for what looks like the same product, the usual cause is not pricing strategy – it is that each of them filled in a different set of blanks. Send the same six items to both and the spreads close.
The six
Dimensions and quantity. Obvious, and still the two most often missing. Quantity matters more than people think because setup costs are spread across units; a quote for five hundred and a quote for five thousand are different products economically.
The application, in one sentence. What it carries, what it sits on, how long it stays loaded. This is what lets a supplier choose thickness or grade, and without it they will choose something conservative and quote accordingly.
Resin and additive requirements. Whether recycled content is needed, whether it goes outdoors, whether it contacts food. Each of these changes the specification and the price, and each is frequently discovered later.
Tolerances. On thickness and on cut dimensions. Leave them out and there is nothing to check against at goods-in.
Delivery terms and destination. Whether you want ex-works, FOB or a landed figure, and to which port. Packaging is bulky, so freight is a large share of landed cost and an ex-works number is not comparable between suppliers on different lanes.
Annual volume, not just this order. A supplier can be flexible on the opening order if the repeat is real. It is the one piece of commercial information that most changes what you are offered.
What a good quote looks like
Unit price, quantity the price applies to, lead time, validity period, delivery terms, and the specification the price is based on – with thickness and grammage stated. If any of those are missing, ask before comparing.
A validity period matters more than it used to. Resin prices move, and a quote without one is a quote a supplier may not honour in three months. Ask for thirty or sixty days and put it in your records.
What to do with two competing quotes
Put them side by side and check which lines differ. If one has a spec and the other does not, you are not comparing the same thing. If one is ex-works and the other landed, convert before comparing – this is where most “the other supplier is cheaper” conclusions come from.
We covered what moves panel price in how much a PP honeycomb panel costs, and the freight half is the one most comparisons miss.
Three things worth adding if you have them
A photograph of what you use now, including any failure. A cracked corner, a bowed panel, a lid that does not sit flat – the failure tells a supplier more about the requirement than the dimension does, and it is the fastest way to get the specification right first time.
A drawing, if one exists, even a rough one with the critical dimensions marked. Marked beats complete: telling a supplier which two dimensions actually matter saves them guessing and saves you a specification that is tight in the wrong places.
And the real deadline rather than the aspirational one. A supplier working to a genuine date can propose an alternative – a standard size, a different grade – that one working to an invented date will not bother offering.
What we can do
We supply PP honeycomb panels and would rather receive six lines of enquiry than two. Send us the six items above – or tell us the application and we will work through them with you – and you will get a quote you can hold us to.