Research Report · April 2026
2026 US Packaging Supply Price Index
We analyzed real pricing data across 16 suppliers and 5,288 products to answer one question: how much does price actually vary for the same packaging item?
Based on 7,928 priced listings. Data collected Q1 2026.
5,288
Products tracked
across bottles, caps & jars
16
Suppliers analyzed
10 publish full pricing
2,028
Products compared
≥2 priced suppliers
37.9%
Median price spread
same product, different supplier
Key Findings
Median 37.9% price gap between suppliers
For the same product, half of all comparable pairs show a spread of 37.9% or more. At 1,000 units that's real money.
Average 24.3% volume discount available
Across 2,909 tiered-pricing listings, buying in volume saves 24.3% on average vs single-unit pricing.
10 of 16 suppliers publish full pricing
Only 10 suppliers show prices for 90%+ of their catalog. The rest require quotes or account setup — a hidden friction cost.
466 products with 100%+ price spread
More than a quarter of comparable products show spreads over 100% — meaning the cheapest supplier is less than half the price of the most expensive.
Price Transparency by Supplier
What share of each supplier's catalog shows public pricing? Full = 90%+, Partial = 40–89%, Limited = 5–39%, Not published = under 5%.
| Supplier | Catalog size | Priced listings | Coverage | Tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Citadel Packaging | 1,268 | 1,268 | 100% | Full |
| General Bottle | 903 | 903 | 100% | Full |
| Aaron Packaging | 711 | 711 | 100% | Full |
| Burch Bottle | 475 | 475 | 100% | Full |
| Cary Company | 301 | 301 | 100% | Full |
| Specialty Bottle | 211 | 211 | 100% | Full |
| Richards Packaging | 186 | 186 | 100% | Full |
| Berlin Packaging | 700 | 690 | 98.6% | Full |
| Bottlestore | 465 | 456 | 98.1% | Full |
| SKS Bottle & Packaging | 881 | 844 | 95.8% | Full |
| Container & Packaging | 2,025 | 1,328 | 65.6% | Partial |
| Bay Area Bottles | 1,955 | 482 | 24.7% | Limited |
| Parkway Jars | 209 | 35 | 16.7% | Limited |
| McKernan Packaging | 941 | 38 | 4% | Not published |
| Oberk | 3,650 | 0 | 0% | Not published |
How Much Do Prices Vary?
For 2,028products with pricing from ≥2 suppliers, here's how the spread (max − min ÷ min) distributes. Products with a price ratio over 10× between suppliers were excluded as likely data normalization errors.
Number of products by price spread range
37.9%
Median spread
64.7%
Average spread
466
Products with 100%+ gap
Biggest Savings Opportunities
Products where the cheapest supplier is significantly cheaper than the most expensive — all verified with real, public pricing.
| Product | Low | High | Spread | Save/100 units |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 oz Clear GLASS Straight Sided Jar [70-400] General Bottle vs Burch Bottle | $0.550 | $5.350 | 873% | $480.00 |
| 2 oz Clear GLASS Boston Round [20-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $0.890 | $8.070 | 807% | $718.00 |
| 2 oz Clear GLASS Boston Round [20-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $0.890 | $8.070 | 807% | $718.00 |
| 2 oz Clear GLASS Boston Round [20-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $0.890 | $8.070 | 807% | $718.00 |
| 5 oz Clear GLASS Woozy [24-414] Aaron Packaging vs Burch Bottle | $0.640 | $5.290 | 727% | $465.00 |
| 16 oz Amber GLASS Boston Round [28-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $2.030 | $15.910 | 684% | $1388.00 |
| 16 oz Amber GLASS Boston Round [28-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $2.030 | $15.910 | 684% | $1388.00 |
| 16 oz Amber GLASS Boston Round [28-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $2.030 | $15.910 | 684% | $1388.00 |
| 16 oz Clear GLASS Boston Round [28-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $2.370 | $14.700 | 520% | $1233.00 |
| 16 oz Clear GLASS Boston Round [28-400] Specialty Bottle vs Berlin Packaging | $2.370 | $14.700 | 520% | $1233.00 |
Volume Discount Depth
Among the 2,909 listings with tiered quantity pricing, how large is the discount from single-unit price to bulk price?
24.3%
Average volume discount
27.5%
Median volume discount
Avg & median volume discount by supplier (suppliers with ≥5 tiered listings)
Blue = average · Light blue = median
Price Range by Product Category
Distribution of minimum unit prices across all priced listings, by section. P10/P25/Median/P75/P90 percentiles shown.
| Category | Listings | P10 | P25 | Median | P75 | P90 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bottles | 3,566 | $0.180 | $0.260 | $0.453 | $0.890 | $2.890 |
| Caps & Closures | 3,295 | $0.070 | $0.100 | $0.170 | $0.286 | $0.481 |
| Jars | 1,046 | $0.240 | $0.340 | $0.510 | $0.740 | $1.270 |
Methodology
Data collection: Pricing data was scraped directly from supplier websites in Q1 2026. Only publicly accessible, catalog-listed prices are included — no account-based or negotiated pricing.
Product matching: Products are matched across suppliers using a deterministic entity-resolution pipeline matching on product category, neck finish, material, color, capacity, and closure type. Only high-confidence matches are included in cross-supplier comparisons.
Price normalization: All prices are normalized to per-unit cost. Case-pack pricing is divided by case quantity. Products where the max-to-min price ratio exceeds 10× between suppliers are excluded as likely normalization errors.
Outlier handling:Within a product's matched listing set, prices more than 5× the median are flagged and excluded from spread calculations. The 5× threshold was chosen to preserve real high-spread pairs while removing clear data errors.
Volume discounts: For listings with tiered quantity pricing, the discount is calculated as (max tier price − min tier price) / max tier price. Only listings with ≥2 distinct price tiers are included.
Coverage: O.Berk and McKernan Packaging do not publish prices on their websites. Their listings are counted in catalog size but excluded from price comparison analyses.
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