The per-unit price: the industry should label it clearly

In the agarwood trade, the same grade of product can carry several different price labels: per box, per gram, per stick, or a stated final price. The more pricing methods there are, the more the one number a buyer can actually calculate gets scattered.

Where does it scatter? Take a box of incense sticks labeled 199 yuan. A buyer compares that number with another seller's 178 yuan, but they are comparing boxes, not incense. How many sticks are in the box, how many grams each stick weighs, and whether the gram weight meets the standard—none of these usage-determining details appear in the price line. The number looks neat, but its reference value is zero.

To arrive at the true cost per stick takes three steps. First, the price per gram of the material itself; second, the total gram weight of the batch; third, how many sticks that weight can produce. Multiply and divide these three figures, and the per-stick price emerges. The process is not hard; what is hard is that the first two figures are often missing from the shelf.

A low gram price does not equal good value—this is the most commonly misunderstood point in the industry. A low gram price is often achieved by making each stick thinner. As stick count rises, the gram weight per stick falls, and burn time shortens accordingly. A buyer who fixates only on the gram price is separating two things that should be viewed together, and separation distorts the picture.

There is also the product form. The same material made into raw wood versus incense sticks has a different cost structure: the former is raw material, while the latter adds incense making, drying, inspection, and tube packing. Viewing a finished product through the lens of raw material naturally makes it seem expensive; conversely, viewing raw material through the lens of a finished product makes it easy to buy things one should not. Each price has its own reasonable range, and comparing them mixed together is meaningless.

So what information should the industry label? I believe at least four items: the executive standard number, net weight in grams, the number of sticks per pack, and the place of origin. These four are not bonus points; they are the necessary conditions for a buyer to calculate that number themselves. Without any one of them, the stated final price remains a number someone else calculated for you, not one you can verify yourself.

Among these four, place of origin is the most easily skipped and the one that should least be skipped. For the same incense, raw material costs from different origins are not on the same order of magnitude, and the final product will not be the same either. A buyer who does not ask about origin is effectively assuming all agarwood has the same cost structure—a premise that does not hold.

Buyers also have a method they can use immediately. After receiving the product, first check the back of the packaging: is there an executive standard number, is the net weight stated, is the stick count given? Then weigh a single stick on a household electronic scale. Two minutes can turn that price sheet from "a reference" into "a verifiable number."

The packaging itself is also worth a look. What material it uses, how many layers seal it, and whether there is filler inside—these look like packaging but are actually cost, and they are key to the condition on arrival. A tube with filler is less likely to break in short-distance transport, but its weight will not match the net weight; thin-shell, lightweight packaging looks material-saving but breaks easily when bumped in transit. An experienced person who opens it and smells the looseness of the powder can tell whether the tube is packed solid or loose.

As for how long each stick burns, accounts vary across the industry. Before there is a unified measured figure, it is safer to rely on the two measurable and countable indicators: gram weight and stick count.

One last point: a low price and a good price are not the same thing. A merchant willing to clearly label gram weight, stick count, and standard deserves a second look; one who labels only a box price and says nothing else is saving effort at the buyer's expense.

There is also a widely circulated saying in the industry: for the same tube, the more sticks, the better the value. That is inaccurate. More sticks only means finer division, and the gram weight per stick falls accordingly, as does burn time. To judge value, one must lay out the per-stick gram weight rather than count how many sticks are in the tube. Only when this point is clear are the three steps above truly completed.

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