Mixed Lots or Single Category: Which Lot to Start With
The direct answer: mixed lots buy you breadth and cost you sorting labour; single-category lots buy you simplicity and cost you money. For a first purchase with no sorting capacity, the single-category lot is almost always the better trade, because the sorting cost of a mixed lot is invisible until you have already paid for it.
Part of the buyer journey: Understanding Stocklots: The Model From the Inside — stage 1 of 8, with the other guides for this stage.
What you are actually buying in a mixed lot
A mixed lot is a specified total quantity spread across categories, sizes and colours. The important question is whether it arrives pre-sorted by category and by size, or as an unsorted dump. The two are priced differently and the price difference is roughly the sorting cost you have just avoided.
Unsorted mixed lots are genuinely cheap and genuinely expensive once you count the hours. That arithmetic is the single most useful calculation a new buyer can do before their first order.
The sorting arithmetic
Count the categories in the lot, estimate how long each takes to sort and grade, multiply by your cost per hour, and add the transport and working capital for the period the stock is unsellable. Then compare that total against the per-piece savings.
Buyers who do this once, honestly, usually find that pre-sorted mixed lots are worthwhile and unsorted ones are not, unless they have their own sorting team.
Where single-category lots win
A single-category lot in a balanced size run can be listed, priced and sold immediately. There is no sorting cost, no storage cost, and no risk of a category you cannot move sitting in the bottom of a pallet.
That immediacy is worth more than it looks, because the money tied up in unsorted stock is money you cannot use to buy the next lot.
What stocklots are available right now?
Reading is step one. Send your requirement and we will check the factory network for current options.
Buyer questions, answered
Are mixed lots cheaper per garment than single-category lots?
Sometimes, but not reliably. A mixed lot can contain a small quantity of an expensive category that has not sold, which brings the average down without helping you. Compare on the categories you actually intend to sell, priced separately, not on the lot average.
What does pre-sorted mean in practice?
That the lot is packed by category and by size, so you can put each group straight into your sales channel. Ask for confirmation with the packing list, and check it against what arrives before you accept the shipment.
How large should a first mixed lot be?
Small enough that you can afford to learn from it. The purpose of a first order is information: which categories sell, how the grading holds up, how long clearance takes. Keep it small enough that a bad outcome is survivable.