Bundle pricing: how to price 1, 3 and 6-bottle offers so every tier earns its place

Bundle pricing sells several units of one product together at a lower price per unit, often one, three and six bottles for a supplement. It works because each order carries one ad cost and one shipping cost, however many bottles it holds, so extra bottles add profit cheaply. Build the tiers from your cost per bottle, recommend one, and judge the mix by profit per visitor.

Why bundle pricing works for supplements

Three things make multi-unit bundles a natural fit for anything people use up.

You pay for the order, not the bottle. If it takes $55 of ad spend to win a buyer, that $55 is spent whether they take one bottle or six. A single bottle has to carry the whole acquisition cost alone. A six-pack spreads it over six.

Shipping is mostly per order too. A box with three bottles often costs little more to send than a box with one. If your carrier charges by weight, use your real rates in the math below.

The supply matches how the product is used. A daily supplement gets used up on a schedule. A three- or six-bottle supply means the buyer doesn't run out halfway through the period they meant to try it, and doesn't have to decide all over again. Size the tiers to the product: if one bottle lasts 30 days, three bottles are a three-month supply.

Bundles fit poorly when nobody needs more than one: a durable product with no use for a spare, or something a buyer has to try once before committing. There, a single unit followed by a relevant offer after checkout is often the better structure, and the upsell funnel guide covers it.

How to set bundle pricing tiers from cost per bottle

Work from your costs up, not from a competitor's prices down. (How to price a supplement sets the single-bottle price itself from the same costs; this section builds the ladder on top of it.) You need four numbers: the landed cost of one bottle (product, packaging and freight to your warehouse), what it costs to pick, pack and ship one order, your payment fees, and what you pay in ads for each order.

A worked example with illustrative numbers: a fictional supplement costs $8.50 a bottle landed, each order costs $7 to ship, payment fees take 4% of the order, and every tier ships free.

Now take out the ad cost. At $55 per order, the single bottle loses money and the bundles carry the offer:

Profit per order after a $55 ad cost

Illustrative numbers: $8.50 a bottle, $7 shipping per order, 4% fees

1 bottle at $59−$13.86

3 bottles at $147recommended$53.62

6 bottles at $234$111.64

That's the core of bundle pricing. In a ladder like this, the single bottle's job is to give hesitant buyers a way in, and the three- and six-packs pay for the traffic. A single bottle that loses money after ads is fine as long as enough buyers choose a bundle, which is why you judge the whole mix rather than each tier on its own. The contribution margin post breaks down the costs behind numbers like these.

Put your own costs and prices into the calculator. It starts with the example above. The number to watch is how much more you keep when a buyer takes three bottles instead of one.

Calculator

Bundle margin calculator

Profit on a 1, 3 and 6-bottle order, before the cost of the ad that brought the buyer.

Cost per bottle (landed)$Shipping and fulfillment per order$Payment fees (% of the order)%Price of 1 bottle$Price of 3 bottles$Price of 6 bottles$

Extra profit when a buyer takes 3 instead of 1

$67.48

1 bottle: profit per order

$41.14

69.7% margin

3 bottles: profit per order

$108.62

73.9% margin · $49.00 a bottle

6 bottles: profit per order

$166.64

71.2% margin · $39.00 a bottle

One shipping cost per order, whatever its size — change it if your carrier charges by weight.

Reset to the example

In the example, that difference is $67.48 before ads. It's what each buyer you move from one bottle to three is worth, and it sets how hard you can push the bundle before the buyers you lose cost more than the upgrades bring.

How big should the discount be on each tier?

No percentage is right for every product. Three checks decide it.

The floor: the biggest bundle must still pay for the order. Subtract what you pay in ads per order, and leave room for refunds. In the example, the six-pack still breaks even after a $55 ad cost at $117.71, or $19.62 a bottle. That's the floor, not a target: the closer you get to it, the less a refund or an expensive week of ads can absorb.

The steps must be easy to read. Buyers compare per-bottle prices, so make each step visible and simple to work out. $59, $49 and $39 a bottle reads at a glance. $59, $52.33 and $44.17 doesn't.

Each cut must earn back what it gives away. Every dollar off the six-pack is a dollar less from buyers who would have taken six anyway. Cut the six-pack from $39 to $35 a bottle ($210), and each six-pack order keeps $143.60 before ads instead of $166.64, so you lose $23.04 on every buyer who already chose it. A buyer who moves up from three bottles to six at the new price is worth $34.98 more. The cut pays only if, for every three buyers who already took six, at least two more step up from three.

Price cuts hurt more than they look, because almost all of a cut comes out of profit. Here is where the money from one three-bottle order goes once the ad cost is counted:

Where one $147 three-bottle order goes

Illustrative numbers, after a $55 ad cost

• Product (3 bottles)$25.5017%
• Shipping$7.005%
• Payment fees$5.884%
• Ad cost$55.0037%
• Profit$53.6236%

Cut that three-pack from $147 to $135, an 8% lower price, and the profit after ads drops from $53.62 to $42.10, about 21% less. Product, shipping and the ad cost don't shrink when the price does. Only the fees do.

Keep the jump in total cost in mind as well. A $234 order is a much bigger decision for a cold visitor than $59, which is one reason to keep a single-bottle option even when it loses money after ads.

Should bundles ship free?

Shipping is the other lever. A ladder that charges shipping on the single bottle and ships bundles free gives buyers a concrete reason to step up. In the example, charging $6.95 on the single raises what that order keeps before ads from $41.14 to $47.81, and the buyer now sees $65.95 for one bottle against $49 a bottle, shipped free, in the three-pack.

Treat "free shipping on 3 and 6 bottles" like any free offer. The FTC's guide on the word "free" says the conditions of a free offer should be stated clearly and conspicuously at the outset, and that terms placed in an asterisked footnote don't count as disclosure at the outset (16 CFR Part 251). Put the condition next to the prices, as visible as the offer itself.

"Buy 3, get 2 free" needs even more care. The same guide expects buyers to pay the regular price for what they must buy, and says the seller shouldn't recover the cost of the free item by marking up the item that must be purchased. If one bottle normally sells for $59, "buy 3, get 2 free" means five bottles for $177, or $35.40 a bottle: cheaper than the six-pack in the example. The guide also says a single size of a product shouldn't carry a "free" offer in one trade area for more than six months in any 12-month period. A "free bottles" bundle that runs all year sits badly with that, and a plain per-bottle ladder says the same thing without the problem. This isn't legal advice: read the guide itself, or ask a lawyer, before you run a free offer.

Which bundle should you highlight?

Recommend the tier that matches how the product is used, and say why in plain words. "Covers your first three months" does more work than a badge, and it's true. Put the recommended tier in the middle, make it visually distinct, and check that it's easy to find on a phone, where the three options stack.

Labels are claims, so each one has to be true:

• Most popular means the tier more buyers choose than any other. On a new launch you don't know that yet, so use "Recommended" with a reason until your orders show it.
• Best value belongs on the lowest price per bottle. In the example, that's the six-pack, not the three-pack.
• Save $30 should compare with a price buyers can really pay on the same page: three single bottles at $59 cost $177, so the three-pack saves $30.
• Was $99 needs a former price you genuinely offered, openly and in good faith, for a reasonably substantial period. A crossed-out price you never genuinely offered is a fictitious reference price under the FTC's pricing guides (16 CFR 233.1).

Here is the difference side by side:

Bundle labels: honest versions and ones to avoid

UseHonest

• Recommended: covers your first three months
• Best value on the lowest price per bottle
• Save $30 against three single bottles at $59
• Most popular, once your orders show it
• Free shipping on 3 and 6 bottles, printed by the price

AvoidMisleading

• Most popular on a page that launched today
• Best value on the middle tier when the six-pack costs less per bottle
• A crossed-out “was $99” you never genuinely offered
• Only 3 left when stock isn’t limited
• Free-shipping conditions explained only in a footnote

Whatever you recommend, the page has to match the video word for word: the same bundle names, quantities, prices and images. In RevvyScales, the offer block holds your bundle offers with their images and prices, and the timed pitch reveal keeps offers, the guarantee and the CTA button hidden until the pitch second you set, so they appear when the presenter reveals the price (player conversion features). How to present the tiers inside the script is covered in the VSL offer guide.

How to test bundle prices: profit per visitor, not AOV

Average order value is the obvious number to watch, and it's the wrong place to stop. A layout that pushes buyers toward the six-pack raises AOV, but if fewer visitors buy at all, you can end up with less. Start with the share of buyers who choose each tier: the calculator turns your prices and that mix into an average order value. It starts with layout B from the table below.

Calculator

Average order value from your bundle mix

Prices and the share of buyers who pick each bundle.

Price of 1 bottle$Price of 3 bottles$Price of 6 bottles$Buyers who pick 1 bottle%Buyers who pick 3 bottles%Buyers who pick 6 bottles%

Average order value

$138.00

Bottles per order

3

Versus selling only single bottles

2.34x

Shares add up to

100.0%

The shares are scaled to 100% if they don’t add up exactly.

Reset to the example

Now add conversion rate and costs. Here are three illustrative layouts of the same offer, each shown to the same traffic at $1.32 of ad spend per visitor:

C has the highest average order value and the lowest profit per visitor. B converts fewer visitors than A and still earns 24 cents more from each one. That's why bundle tests are judged per visitor; the revenue per visitor guide explains the measure and the sample-size traps, and how to increase average order value covers the levers beyond bundles.

A few rules keep these price tests honest:

• Change one thing at a time: the prices, the recommended tier or the shipping terms, not all three.
• Run each test over full weeks, so weekday and weekend buyers are both counted.
• Wait for enough orders. A difference of a few orders between arms is noise.
• Count refunds by tier and by arm, and wait until the guarantee window has closed before you call the result.

On the Growth plan and up, RevvyScales runs offer split tests inside one VSL: different bundles, prices or offer headlines, each shown by weight, with every viewer kept on the same version (offer split tests).

Guarantees and refunds on bundles

Use one guarantee for every tier. A guarantee that gets shorter or stricter as the order grows works against the upgrade you're asking for. If refunds on a bundle depend on returning unopened bottles, that's a condition, and it belongs next to the guarantee, not only on the terms page. The FTC's guides on guarantee advertising say a "money back guarantee" should mean a refund of the full purchase price at the buyer's request, with material limitations or conditions disclosed (16 CFR Part 239).

A refunded six-pack returns more cash than a refunded single bottle, so the cost of each refund grows with the order. Track refunds by tier. If one tier refunds far more than the others, look at what the page promised the buyers who chose it. The money-back guarantee post covers terms, length and how to write the policy.

A bundle pricing checklist

1. Write down your landed cost per bottle, shipping per order, fee percentage and current ad cost per order.
2. Work out profit per order for each tier, before and after ads.
3. Set per-bottle prices in steps buyers can read at a glance, and check the floor on your biggest bundle.
4. Decide shipping: free on bundles and charged on the single, or free on everything, with any condition printed by the price.
5. Label honestly: recommended with a reason, best value on the lowest per-bottle price, most popular only from your orders.
6. Match bundle names, prices and images between the video, the offer block and the checkout.
7. Test one change at a time, and judge it by profit per visitor after refunds.