Your brand on the carton, our factory behind it
Private label from 500 kg or 1,000 units per SKU — grinders, shakers, jars, pouches, gift sets, retail cartons and the artwork files to go with them. A physical proof ships before we run a single unit of production.
Ten formats, and what each one really costs to run
Private label in this industry usually means a sticker on a generic jar. What follows is the full range, with honest minimums, because the format you pick drives your cost per unit far more than the salt inside it does.
| Format | Typical fill | MOQ | Indicative unit cost | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grinder-topped glass jar | 100–200 g coarse | 2,000 units | $1.35–$2.20 | Test your grinder body with our grain before you commit |
| PET grinder, disposable | 90–140 g coarse | 3,000 units | $0.85–$1.40 | Cheapest grinder route, lighter freight |
| Glass jar with shaker cap | 150–400 g fine | 2,000 units | $0.95–$1.70 | Watch the humidity spec fine salt cakes in a shaker |
| Stand-up kraft pouch | 250 g – 1 kg | 3,000 units | $0.55–$1.15 | Best cost per kilo. Needs a good moisture barrier |
| Retail bag, 2–5 lb | 0.9–2.3 kg | 1,000 units | $1.90–$3.60 | The US grocery and Amazon workhorse |
| Bath salt jar or tub | 300 g – 1 kg | 1,500 units | $1.20–$2.80 | Blended fills add a 500 kg per-fragrance minimum |
| Gift set, 3–5 pieces | Mixed | 1,000 sets | $4.20–$11.00 | Rigid box, insert tray, ribbon. Q4 lead times double |
| Salt lamp, branded carton | 2–7 kg lamp | 500 pcs | Lamp + $0.65–$1.40 | Carton, hang tag, instruction leaflet, barcode |
| Cooking block, sleeve + leaflet | 1 pc | 300 pcs | Block + $0.85–$1.60 | Care leaflet is not optional it cuts returns |
| Bulk bag, your print | 25 kg / 50 lb | 2,000 bags | +$0.22–$0.40 / bag | For distributors selling on to repackers |
Unit costs are ex-works and exclude the salt itself see the pricing page for salt bands. Print costs assume a single artwork version per SKU; multi-language or multi-market variants add plate charges.
Six to nine weeks from brief to sealed carton
Every stage below has a decision point where you can stop, change something, or walk away. Nothing goes to production without your written approval on a physical sample.
Brief & quote 3 to 5 days
You send the format, fill weight, annual volume and target landed cost. We come back with a costed spec, a dieline and the mandatory regulatory text your market needs printed on it.
Artwork & proof 10 to 14 days
You supply print-ready files or we lay them out. Then a digital proof, then a physical sample of the actual pack, filled with the actual salt, couriered to you.
Pilot run 7 to 10 days
Optional but strongly advised for grinders and shakers: 500 kg or a few hundred units through the real line, so a mechanism problem shows up at pilot scale rather than at 10,000 units.
Production & ship 18 to 28 days
Full run, lot testing, packing, loading photos and the documents. Ocean transit is on top of this budget 30 to 45 days to a US port.
Roughly a third of first-time private-label projects change something after the physical sample arrives: a cap that leaks fine salt, a label that curls on a curved jar, a colour that printed warmer than the screen, a grinder that jams on 4 mm grain. Every one of those is cheap to fix at proof stage and expensive to fix on a pallet.
Gift sets, rigid boxes and printed cartons all slow down from about August as the whole region runs Christmas volume. If you need gift product on a US shelf for November, the order needs to be confirmed by early July. Every year we have this conversation in September with someone.
The regulatory text we will insist on printing
This is the part private-label buyers most often get wrong, and it is the most expensive to get wrong, because the fix is re-labelling a shipment that has already crossed an ocean.
United States, retail salt
- The iodide statement. Under 21 CFR 100.155, salt that is not iodised must carry "This salt does not supply iodide, a necessary nutrient" immediately after the product name, in type at least as large as the net-quantity declaration. Iodised salt carries the positive version. Packages under half an ounce are exempt.
- Nutrition Facts panel per 21 CFR 101.9, with sodium per serving.
- Net quantity in both metric and US customary units, in the lower third of the principal display panel.
- Name and place of business of the manufacturer, packer or distributor.
- Country of origin marking.
Canada
Bilingual English and French labelling requirements apply to most prepackaged food, and your Safe Food for Canadians licence obligations sit with you as the Canadian importer. Confirm the specifics with your regulatory advisor before we go to plate we will print what your advisor signs off, and we will flag anything that looks wrong to us.
Bath and cosmetic products
Bath salt intended for soaking is generally regulated as a cosmetic in the US provided no therapeutic claims are made. The moment a label says it relieves, treats or cures anything, the product is being marketed as a drug and the rules change completely. We supply the ingredient documentation, the INCI name (Sodium Chloride not Maris Sal, which designates sea salt), the allergen statement for any fragrance, and the IFRA certificate from the fragrance house. The registration and product listing obligations that came in under MoCRA sit with the US responsible person, which is you. Take your own regulatory advice; we are salt manufacturers, not your compliance department.
Air purification claims for lamps. "Healthier than table salt." Detox, alkalising, pH balancing or weight-loss claims. Any disease claim. We have lost private-label enquiries over this and we are fine with that the enforcement risk lands on your brand, not ours, but our name is on the production record.
What you get in the file pack
- DielineAI + PDF
- Print specSubstrate, finish, plates
- Regulatory text blockMarket-specific
- BarcodeYou supply GS1 prefix
- Master carton specCount, cube, weight
- Pallet configurationDiagram + tie/high
- Spec sheet & COAPer lot
Your brand stays yours, including on the way out
Three things we put in writing at the start of every private-label relationship, because the industry does not have a great record here.
- Your artwork and trade marks are yours. We use them to produce your goods and for nothing else. We will not run your design for another buyer with the name swapped, which happens more than anyone admits.
- Plates and custom tooling are yours once paid. If you move supplier, we ship them to whoever you name. We do not hold them as leverage.
- No exclusivity theatre. We will agree genuine exclusivity on a bespoke pack format or a specific fragrance blend if you commit to volume. We will not pretend that plain 0.3–1 mm pink salt is exclusive to anyone, because it is not, and a supplier who tells you otherwise is managing you rather than supplying you.
Minimums, by what triggers first
| Salt per SKU | 500 kg |
| Finished units per SKU | 1,000 |
| Blended bath fragrance | 500 kg per scent |
| Printed bulk bags | 2,000 bags |
| Rigid gift box | 1,000 sets |
| Artwork revisions included | Two rounds |
| Physical proof | Always, before production |
Below these numbers, buy plain bulk salt from 25 kg and pack it yourself. It is what we would tell a friend to do, and it is how four of our current private-label accounts began.
Private-label questions, answered properly
500 kg of salt per SKU or 1,000 finished units, whichever comes first. The floor is real: artwork setup, plates and a proofing round cost roughly the same whether you order 1,000 units or 50,000, so below that point the setup swamps the unit economics and you would be better off packing plain bulk salt yourself.
We supply dielines, print specifications and the mandatory regulatory text, and we will lay out a competent design if you have nothing. But we are a salt factory with a print buyer, not a branding agency. If the brand matters commercially and on a retail shelf it does hire a designer and send us their print-ready files.
We can match a pack format, a fill weight and a grain size. We will not copy a competitor's artwork, trade dress or brand identity, and we will say no in writing if asked. Beyond the ethics, it is the fastest route to your listing being taken down.
You approve a physical proof before production; that approval is what we print against. We flag anything we believe is non-compliant before plate stage the iodide statement catches people constantly but final regulatory responsibility for a label in your market sits with you as the brand owner. If we print something different from the approved proof, that is our error and our cost.
Yes, and for a first private-label run we encourage it. If you cannot travel, we will run a live video call from the line during the first hour of production, which most buyers find does the same job.
Yes fragrance, colour, botanicals and carrier oils, at a 500 kg minimum per fragrance because a blending run has setup and cleandown cost regardless of batch size. We shortlist three fragrance options against your brief and send lab samples in 10 to 14 days. Details on the bath and spa salt page.
We replace it on the next sailing at our cost. That clause goes into the contract rather than living on a web page, and it has been invoked there is a moisture failure described honestly in our case studies.
Send us a spec — we quote within one working day
Tell us the grade, grain size, packing and destination port. You get a written quotation, a specification sheet, and a sample on its way the same week. Trial orders start at 25 kg.