White Mountain Puzzles — Margin breakdown

Researched profile. The figures here are modelled by us from public information, published with the sources they were drawn from. How we research.

Margin breakdown

Read Sep 2026. Figures here are a reading taken then, not a live feed.

Every cent of a $19.46 average sale, down to the third of it that is left — after Amazon’s two cuts, which together take more than twice what the puzzle costs to make and move.

A 1,000-piece puzzle is a big box for a $20 product, and Amazon prices fulfilment by size and weight rather than by price: about $6.02 to pick, pack and ship each one. Add the 15% referral fee and Amazon takes 46% of every sale before the puzzle itself is paid for.

• Cost of goods: -19% of revenue — $3.70 a unit — $2.70 to make and $1.00 to move — against a $19.46 average sale. A placeholder carried over from an earlier pass and never quoted.
• Amazon referral fee: -15% of revenue — Amazon’s published Toys & Games rate, a flat 15%.
• FBA fulfilment: -31% of revenue — About $6.02 a unit, from the per-listing fees Amazon charges. The largest line here, and the one a bulky, low-priced product cannot negotiate.
• Advertising: -2% of revenue — Modelled, not observed. They buy sponsored placement on their own brand name and none on generic searches, which puts spend in the low single digits of revenue.
• Margin: 33% — Before returns and overhead, both set to zero, so this is a ceiling on profit rather than profit.

The cost-of-goods line is the weakest figure on this profile. The $2.70-plus-$1.00 split came from an earlier estimate, and their own pages say every puzzle is manufactured in America, which that split was not built around. It moves the margin more than any other line, and it is the first thing to replace with a real number.

White Mountain Puzzles overview · All ideas