Last updated: October 2026
By Jack Lv, General Manager — 925 sterling silver and GRA moissanite manufacturing in Foshan since 2011
A minimum order quantity is negotiable, but only against the costs a factory genuinely cannot spread across more units, and a brand-new mould is the one item you will almost never talk away. Nabest runs a baseline of 10 pieces per design, with 3 percent off at 50 pieces and 6 percent off at 100 pieces, but the savings that matter usually come from the design choice rather than the quantity.
A minimum order quantity, or MOQ, is the smallest number of pieces a factory will run a single design for before the setup work stops being worth its time. The number is not arbitrary and it is not a negotiating tactic. Every design carries setup: a mould or die for casting, a slot in the plating bath, a batch in the polishing and setting line, and a normal loss rate across the whole run.
The costs that drive an MOQ are the fixed ones, meaning the costs that stay the same whether you order 10 pieces or 100. A new mould is the clearest example, because it costs the same to cut for a small order as for a large one, so on a short run it is spread across very few units and the per-piece price rises sharply. Plating bath setup and casting setup behave the same way: both need a minimum load to run at stable chemistry and temperature.
| Cost item | Fixed or variable | Why it sets a floor |
|---|---|---|
| New mould or die | Fixed | One cost regardless of run size, so it dominates the unit price of a small order |
| Plating bath setup | Fixed per run | The bath must be made up and stabilised, and a small load wastes most of it |
| Casting batch | Fixed per run | Metal is melted and poured in a batch that needs a minimum size for a clean flow |
| Setting and polishing labour | Mostly variable | Falls with fewer pieces, but each piece still takes similar hands-on time |
| Normal loss rate | Variable | A share of every run is lost to defects and finishing, and it does not disappear on small orders |
| Packaging | Variable | Boxes and tags scale with units, so packaging rarely sets the floor by itself |
When you ask for a smaller minimum you are asking the factory to absorb setup it cannot spread across enough units, so it helps to know which costs are actually fixed. A new mould is fixed and unavoidable. Plating and casting setup are fixed per run, which means they can be shared when the design already runs on the line and cannot when it does not.
Labour, metal and packaging are broadly variable: they fall roughly with the number of pieces. That is why a factory will move on quantity far more readily than on tooling, and why a supplier who offers an unusually low minimum on a brand-new design is usually charging for the mould somewhere inside the unit price.
There are several legitimate levers, and each trades something away. The table below is written from the buyer's side, because the cost of a lower minimum is nearly always paid by the buyer somewhere else in the deal.
| Lever | What you give up | When it works |
|---|---|---|
| Order an existing design instead of a new one | You lose exclusivity, because other buyers can order the same design | A first order, when you are testing a market rather than launching a signature piece |
| Mix several styles in one order | Per-style quantity stays low, so the deeper tier prices do not apply | When you want breadth across a range rather than depth in one design |
| Start small and commit to a reorder | You commit future volume before you have sales data to justify it | When the design is proven and only the scale is genuinely uncertain |
| Accept standard packaging | Your brand presentation is weaker at launch | When packaging can be upgraded on the reorder without changing the piece |
| Accept a longer lead time | You wait while your design shares a production slot with larger jobs | When the item is not tied to a fixed selling season |
| Buy from in-stock designs | You are limited to what has already been made | When you need a small first parcel quickly to test a channel |
A brand-new design that needs its own mould is the case where the answer is no, and it is a fair no rather than a refusal to help. The mould is a fixed cost and there is no honest way to recover it across a handful of pieces. Your realistic choices are to pay for the tooling once, to take the new design at the standard minimum, or to adapt a design that already has tooling behind it.
The same limit applies to a finish that has to be set up specially, or to a stone size and setting that is not part of the running range. If the factory can already run something, quantity is elastic. If it has to build the capability for you first, quantity is not the variable you are negotiating.
The minimum belongs in the quotation, not only in an email. Negotiated terms that stay in a chat thread are the terms that get disputed at shipment, so it is worth writing them down while the deal is still friendly.
Nabest is a Foshan factory working in 925 sterling silver and VVS moissanite, founded in 2011, with a 3,000 square metre plant and a monthly capacity of 15,000 pieces. Quotations are returned within 24 hours Monday to Saturday, the baseline order is 10 pieces per design, and the ladder runs at 3 percent off at 50 pieces and 6 percent off at 100 pieces.
A mould made for your design is kept for your reorders rather than reused for other buyers, and designs developed only for you are not sold to other buyers. Those are terms worth confirming in writing even when the minimum itself does not move, because they protect the value of the design rather than the size of the order.
You can, but the mould for a new design is a fixed cost that does not shrink with the order, so a small first run is the most expensive way to buy it per piece. The realistic options are to pay for the tooling, to take the new design at the standard minimum, or to adapt a design that already has tooling.
The structure improves, but the curve is gentle rather than dramatic. At Nabest the step-down is 3 percent at 50 pieces and 6 percent at 100 pieces, so the larger savings usually come from choosing an existing design over a new development rather than from pushing quantity alone.
Often yes, and it is a common way to open an account without committing to depth in one design. Check whether the minimum is applied per design or per order, because mixing usually lets you meet a per-order minimum while each style still sits at its own low per-design quantity.
For a first order it usually is, because there is no new tooling and the design is already running. The trade-off is that you do not own the design, so other buyers can order the same piece and you are competing on the same product.
The minimum per design, whether designs can be mixed, the tier prices with the quantity each tier starts at, mould ownership and the reorder arrangement, the lead time for that quantity, and the policy if the shipment arrives short through losses.
Send your design, size and quantity — factory quote back within 24 hours. Reference: General enquiry