Costing the Style
The Costs tab is where the Tech Pack stops being a manufacturing document and starts being a commercial one. It answers: given everything we know about this style — fabric, trims, labor, services — what does it cost to make, and what should we sell it for?
The tab has three sections: Commercial, Finance, and Results.
Commercial
The Commercial section is where you set the high-level commercial parameters: the currency the cost is in, the markup percentage you want to apply, and the selling rate the brand or customer pays.
For a style you're costing internally before quoting, you usually enter cost inputs and let markup determine selling rate. For a style where the price is already set with the brand, you enter selling rate and let GarmentFlow tell you what margin you're actually going to make.
Finance
The Finance section pulls the inputs that feed the calculation: material cost (from the Bill of Materials), labor cost (from Services), and any overhead you allocate per garment. Each line is sourced from the Logistics tab, so the figures here move as the spec evolves.
If a number on this section looks wrong, the fix is almost always upstream — adjust the consumption on Raw Materials or the minutes on Services, and the Finance section follows.
Results
The Results section is the bottom line: total cost, total selling rate, margin in currency, margin in percent. This is what shows up on the Tech Pack Cost Margin Snapshot report, and it's what your commercial team will be looking at when they decide whether the style is worth running.
Image: The Costs tab on a Tech Pack with Commercial, Finance, and Results sections showing a worked margin calculation
A working example
Say you're costing a 500-unit denim jacket for a new brand:
- The Bill of Materials adds up to $18.40 in fabric, trims, and labels per garment.
- Services (cutting, stitching, finishing) come to $6.20 per garment.
- You want a 35% markup on cost.
Finance shows $24.60 total cost. Commercial multiplies by 1.35 to give a selling rate of $33.21. Results shows the margin: $8.61 per garment, $4,305 across the 500-unit run.
The brand pushes back and asks for $30 a unit. Drop the selling rate, and Results immediately shows your margin compressed to $5.40 — 18% instead of 26%. That's the conversation the Costs tab is designed to enable: numbers move in real time, and you can decide whether to negotiate, re-spec, or walk.
What to do next
If the style is commercially viable and the spec is firm, move the Tech Pack through the workflow toward Production Ready. From there, production takes over.