The real cost of a consumable is not the price, it is the price per use

Comparison between two products is almost always made on the pack price, and it is the quickest route to the wrong choice.

The number that counts is cost per use, meaning what you spend each time you use the product on a patient. Between the two figures the gap can be considerable.

The simplest case is packs of different sizes. A hundred pieces at twenty euros and a hundred and fifty at twenty-seven look like similar prices, but the unit cost differs by over ten per cent.

It is a calculation nobody does in their head, and price lists rarely present it. Bringing everything back to a common unit is the most elementary step and the one most often missing.

The less obvious case concerns products where the quantity used varies. With a dispensed material, yield depends on the formulation: two products at the same price per gram can give a different number of applications.

Here the only way to know is to count the applications obtained from one pack over a defined period. It is information no price list contains and it is worth more than any price comparison.

Then there is waste, the most neglected item. A product in a large pack at a better unit price becomes more expensive if part of it expires before use.

For slow-moving items the small pack is almost always the better buy, even at a higher unit price, which is the opposite of what the price list suggests.

Time is another invisible item. A product requiring longer preparation, or occasionally failing and forcing a repeat, carries a cost that appears on no invoice but exists.

On a material used several times a day, two extra minutes of preparation are hours every month, and they belong in the comparison.

The last item is the cost of failure, and it concerns critical products. A material failing once in a hundred costs, in redone work, far more than the price difference that led to choosing it.

A practical way to apply all this without becoming an accountant is to calculate cost per use only on the items that weigh most. The top ten by annual spend generally cover the large majority of the total.

In summary: bring prices to a common unit before comparing, count real applications for variable-yield products, factor in waste on slow-moving items, include time and failures, and run the calculation only on the items that genuinely matter.