Writing a wholesale line sheet buyers can order from

Aug 27
3 min read

Updated: 1 day ago

Introduction

A line sheet is the document a retail buyer uses to place an order. It is not a brochure, a lookbook or a story about your brand, and confusing the two is the most common mistake small suppliers make.

Buyers work quickly across many suppliers. They need to see what you sell, what it costs, what they must order and when it arrives — on one page, in a format they recognise.

1. Writing a wholesale line sheet means building a working document

Judge every element by whether it helps somebody place an order.

Product, code, price, minimum, lead time, case quantity. A beautifully designed page with no product codes and no prices cannot be ordered from, however well it represents the brand, and buyers will not chase you for the missing information.

2. Include the information buyers cannot proceed without

There is a standard set and omitting any of it stalls the order.

Product name and code, wholesale price, recommended retail price, minimum order value or quantity, case or pack size, lead time, and available variants. Then your contact details, payment terms and shipping arrangements.

3. Show both wholesale and recommended retail prices

The margin is the buyer's first calculation and you should do it for them.

Displaying both figures lets them see immediately whether the product works commercially. A sheet showing only the trade price requires them to guess your intended retail positioning, which frequently means they invent a higher one.

4. Use clear product codes and keep them stable

An unglamorous detail that matters throughout the relationship.

Every variant needs a unique code that appears on the line sheet, the order, the invoice and the packaging. Codes that change between seasons create ordering errors, and errors on wholesale orders are expensive to resolve.

5. Keep the photography plain and consistent

Trade photography has a different job from marketing photography.

The product, clearly, against a plain background, at consistent scale, so a buyer can see exactly what they are getting. Save styled lifestyle imagery for a separate lookbook, which is a legitimate companion document.

6. State your minimums plainly, including the reorder minimum

Buyers need to know the commitment before they engage.

The opening order minimum and the lower reorder minimum, if you have one. Hiding this until later wastes everybody's time, and a clearly stated reasonable minimum reads as professionalism rather than as a barrier.

7. Be honest about lead times

An unrealistic lead time causes more damage than a long one.

Retail buying works to seasons and delivery windows, and a missed date can mean the product misses the season entirely. State what you can genuinely achieve, including production time, and update it when your capacity changes.

8. Keep it to one or two pages and send it as a PDF

Format matters more than suppliers expect.

A single PDF that opens on any device, prints legibly and can be forwarded internally. Not a link requiring a login, not a spreadsheet, not six separate images. Buyers forward these to colleagues and file them, so make that easy.

9. Version and date it, and reissue when anything changes

Line sheets circulate for a long time.

A date and version number on every sheet, and a fresh one whenever prices, minimums or the range change. Orders placed from an eighteen-month-old sheet at old prices are a recurring and entirely avoidable argument.

Conclusion

Build a document somebody can order from, because that is the line sheet's only job and a brochure cannot do it.

Include codes, wholesale and retail prices, minimums, case sizes and lead times, keep product codes unique and stable, use plain consistent photography and leave styling to a separate lookbook, state opening and reorder minimums openly, give honest lead times, deliver it as a one or two page PDF that forwards easily, and version and date every issue so old prices do not come back to you.