Sales
A wholesale sales rep takes 10% to 15% commission on every order they close. Managing retail outreach in-house costs your time, which has a dollar value whether you pay yourself or not. The right choice depends on your current revenue, how much wholesale you can realistically close yourself, and whether you need trade show coverage or can work entirely through online channels.
Most wholesale reps work on commission only. The standard range is 10% to 15% of the wholesale order value, paid when the retailer pays you, not when they place the order. Some reps charge a monthly retainer of $500 to $2,000 against future commissions, which means you pay upfront and the retainer gets credited once orders start closing.
If a rep closes $10,000 in wholesale orders in a month at 12% commission, you pay $1,200. If your net margin after product cost and fulfillment is 40%, that $10,000 in revenue leaves you $4,000 in gross profit, and the rep takes $1,200 of it, leaving you $2,800. The rep keeps 30% of your margin on the business they bring in.
Reps typically focus on trade shows, in-person buyer meetings, and their existing retailer relationships. They do not usually manage your online marketplace presence, respond to inbound inquiries from your website, or follow up on sample requests that come through a wholesale portal. That work still falls to you unless you hire someone else to handle it.
If you handle retail outreach yourself, the cost is the value of your time. Founders often treat their own time as free, but it has an opportunity cost. If you could be designing new products, fulfilling DTC orders, or running paid ads that generate $50 per hour in profit, then spending 10 hours per week on wholesale outreach costs you $500 per week in foregone work, or about $2,000 per month.
Outreach tasks include building a buyer list, writing and sending cold emails, following up on sample requests, updating your line sheet, answering questions about minimums and terms, processing orders, and tracking reorders. For a brand doing $5,000 to $15,000 per month in wholesale, this work typically takes 8 to 15 hours per week once the system is running.
If you close $10,000 in wholesale orders in a month and it took you 40 hours, your time cost at $50 per hour is $2,000. You keep the full $4,000 in gross profit instead of paying $1,200 to a rep, but the $2,000 in time cost leaves you $2,000 net, which is $800 less than the rep scenario. The in-house model only wins if your time cost is lower or if you close more volume than a rep would.
A rep pays for themselves when the orders they close exceed what you would close on your own in the same amount of time, after accounting for their commission. Start with your current monthly wholesale revenue and the hours you spend on it. Divide revenue by hours to get your revenue per hour. Multiply that by your net margin percentage to get profit per hour.
Example: you close $8,000 per month in wholesale, spend 30 hours per month on outreach and order management, and your net margin is 40%. Your revenue per hour is $267, and your profit per hour is $107. If a rep closes $15,000 per month at 12% commission, they take $1,800, leaving you $4,200 in profit after their cut. You were making $3,200 per month in profit before, so the rep adds $1,000 per month and frees up 30 hours. If you can use those 30 hours to generate more than $1,000 in profit elsewhere, the rep is worth it.
If the rep only closes $8,000 per month, the same volume you were closing, they take $960 in commission and you net $2,240 instead of $3,200. You are paying $960 per month for no additional revenue. The rep needs to close at least 30% more than you were closing on your own to break even after their commission, assuming your time cost is real.
Reps excel at trade shows and in-person relationship building. They know buyers, they work multiple brands in complementary categories, and they can walk a booth or take meetings at a regional gift show without you being there. If your product category relies on trade shows for discovery, a rep with an established booth and buyer list can get you in front of 50 to 200 qualified retailers in a weekend. Doing that yourself costs booth fees, travel, lodging, and three to four days of your time.
Reps are weak at online outreach, marketplace management, and portal follow-up. Most reps do not send cold emails, do not manage your Faire or RangeMe profile, and do not respond to sample requests that come through your website. They also do not typically handle order entry, shipping coordination, or reorder reminders. If a retailer places an order through your wholesale ordering portal, the rep may not even know about it unless you tell them, and they will still expect their commission if the retailer is in their territory.
Reps work territories. If you hire a rep for the Southeast, they expect commission on every order from a retailer in that region, even if the retailer found you on Faire and placed the order without the rep's involvement. This is standard in the industry, and it means you cannot easily run your own outreach in parallel without either paying double commission or creating conflict.
A hybrid approach assigns the rep to trade shows and in-person buyer meetings, and keeps online outreach, marketplace management, and inbound follow-up in-house. The rep gets commission only on orders they directly source. This structure is non-standard, and some reps will decline it, but it works for brands that generate significant inbound interest and want to avoid paying commission on orders they close themselves.
Example: you hire a rep to work two trade shows per year and take in-person meetings with buyers they already know. They close $30,000 in wholesale orders per year from those activities, and you pay them 12% commission, or $3,600. You handle all email outreach, Faire, RangeMe, and sample requests yourself, closing another $50,000 per year with no commission paid. Total wholesale revenue is $80,000, and your commission cost is $3,600 instead of $9,600 if the rep had taken 12% of the full $80,000.
This model requires clear tracking. You need to know which orders came from the rep's efforts and which came from your own channels. A shared spreadsheet or CRM with lead source tags works. The rep needs to report which buyers they contacted and when, and you need to mark those accounts so you do not contact them separately. Without tracking, disputes over commission happen frequently.
Another hybrid structure has the founder handle cold outreach and sample requests, and the rep takes over once a retailer is interested. The rep does the closing call, negotiates terms, and manages reorders. The founder pays a lower commission rate, typically 5% to 8%, because the rep is not doing the prospecting work.
This works for founders who are comfortable with email outreach and line sheet design but do not want to spend time on phone calls, term negotiations, or reorder follow-up. The rep acts as a closer and account manager rather than a full-service sales partner. The lower commission rate reflects the reduced scope.
Example: you generate 20 qualified leads per month through cold email and Faire. The rep calls each lead, closes 30% of them, and manages reorders. You close $12,000 per month in new orders and the rep earns 6% commission, or $720. You keep $4,080 in profit after the rep's cut and after your time cost of 15 hours per month at $50 per hour, or $750. Net profit is $3,330. If you handled closing yourself, you would spend 25 hours per month instead of 15, costing $1,250 in time, and net $2,750. The rep adds $580 per month in net profit by taking the closing work off your plate.
Hire a rep first if your product category is trade-show dependent, if you have no experience with retail buyers, or if you cannot commit 10 hours per week to wholesale outreach. Categories like home goods, jewelry, and specialty food rely heavily on regional trade shows where buyers expect to see products in person. A rep with an established presence at those shows can get you orders in the first 90 days that would take you six months to generate on your own.
Hire a rep first if your time is worth more than $75 per hour in other parts of the business. If you are a product designer, a paid ads specialist, or a fulfillment operator, your time may generate more profit in your core role than in wholesale outreach. Paying 12% commission to a rep who closes $15,000 per month costs you $1,800, but if you would need 20 hours to close that same volume and your time is worth $100 per hour elsewhere, the rep saves you $200 per month.
Do not hire a rep if you have no wholesale revenue yet. Reps want to see proof that retailers will buy your product before they commit their time. Most reps expect you to have at least $3,000 to $5,000 per month in existing wholesale orders, a working line sheet, clear payment terms, and a handful of retailer references. If you are starting from zero, handle the first 10 to 20 accounts yourself so you understand the sales process and can train a rep later.
Keep wholesale in-house if your product sells well on Faire, RangeMe, or through direct outreach, and you can commit 10 to 15 hours per week to the work. Brands that generate strong inbound interest from a DTC presence, influencer partnerships, or paid ads often do not need a rep because buyers are already searching for them. Managing those inbound leads yourself costs time but no commission, and you keep the full margin.
Keep wholesale in-house if your average order size is under $300. Small order values make commission expensive relative to the work involved. A $200 order at 12% commission pays the rep $24, but the rep still needs to send emails, make calls, and process the order. Most reps will not prioritize low-value accounts, and you will end up doing the work anyway. In-house outreach makes more sense when order values are small and volume needs to be high.
Keep wholesale in-house if you are testing the channel and do not know yet whether it will be profitable. Reps expect consistency. If you are not sure wholesale fits your business model, spend three to six months managing it yourself, track your time and profit per account, and decide whether the channel is worth scaling before you bring in a rep and commit to their commission structure.
GWO charges 3% commission on wholesale orders and runs managed outreach, builds a wholesale ordering portal, and provides a live dashboard and CRM. The 3% rate is lower than a typical rep because GWO does not attend trade shows or take in-person meetings. The service handles email sequences, LinkedIn outreach, ringless voicemail, and marketplace management, which most reps do not do.
GWO also charges monthly fees, and the commission is credited against those fees, so you pay whichever is greater in any given month. If the monthly fee is $1,000 and GWO generates $40,000 in wholesale orders, the 3% commission is $1,200, so you pay $1,200 that month. If GWO generates $20,000 in orders, the commission is $600, so you pay the $1,000 monthly fee.
This structure works for brands that want online outreach and marketplace management without paying 10% to 15% commission. It does not replace a trade show rep. If your category requires in-person selling, you would use GWO for online channels and hire a rep for shows, creating a hybrid model where each partner handles the channel they are best at.
Run a 90-day pilot before committing to either model full-time. Hire a rep for one trade show or one region, and handle online outreach yourself during the same period. Track revenue, time cost, and profit for each channel separately. Compare the rep's results against your own results, and calculate the net profit per hour for each approach.
If the rep closes $18,000 in 90 days and takes $2,160 in commission, and you close $15,000 in the same period with 40 hours per month of your time at $50 per hour, or $6,000 in time cost, the rep delivered $5,040 in net profit and you delivered $3,000. The rep won. If the rep only closes $10,000, they delivered $2,800 in net profit, and you delivered $3,000. You won, and you should keep wholesale in-house or find a better rep.
The pilot also reveals whether the rep's accounts reorder. A rep who closes 10 new accounts in 90 days but sees no reorders in months four through six is not building sustainable relationships. A rep who closes five accounts that reorder consistently is more valuable long-term, even if the initial revenue is lower. Track sales velocity by channel to see which approach generates repeat business.
If you can commit 10 hours per week to wholesale and your product works on Faire or through cold email, start in-house. Build your buyer list, send 50 emails per week, follow up on sample requests, and close your first 10 accounts yourself. Once you hit $5,000 per month in wholesale revenue and the work starts taking more than 15 hours per week, hire a rep for trade shows or bring in an agency like GWO for online outreach.
If you cannot commit the time or your category requires trade shows, hire a rep first. Give them two shows and 90 days to prove they can close accounts and generate reorders. If they succeed, expand their territory. If they do not, switch to in-house outreach or find a different rep. Do not stay with a rep who is not closing orders just because you signed a contract. Most rep agreements allow either party to terminate with 30 to 60 days notice.
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