"We just want to make sure our parents can afford them."

The order got smaller three times

It started at 1,500 pins at 2 inch, quoted at $1.23 each — $1.43 with two glitter colours. At that size and volume it also came with a free 3ft x 6ft vinyl banner and 100 free upgrade pins.

Price shown is what this order was quoted at, for this quantity, size and specification, on this date. It is not a current price list.

Then 1,000.

Then this:

"we just want to make sure our parents can afford them! Can you quote me for 800 1.5 in. No glitter please?"

Who actually pays for trading pins

That sentence is the most useful thing on this page, because it names something most pin conversations talk around.

The team does not pay for the pins. The parents do — usually per player, usually alongside tournament fees, uniforms, travel and a hotel for the week. Whoever is organising the order is holding a number they have to be able to justify to twelve families, several of whom are already stretched.

So "can we do it cheaper" is rarely about wanting a discount. It is about a person who does not want to be the reason a kid's family has another bill.

Asking for 800 at 1.5 inch with no glitter is that person doing their job properly.

What it cost, and what it cost

1.5 inch at 800 pieces: $1.10 a pin. Against $1.23 at 2 inch for 1,500, the per-pin rate barely moved — the saving came almost entirely from buying 700 fewer pins.

quoted for this order only — quoted for that order only.

But dropping below 2 inch also gave up the free banner and the 100 free upgrade pins.

That is the honest arithmetic, and it is worth doing before shrinking an order. Sometimes the promotion attached to the larger size is worth more than the money saved by avoiding it. Sometimes it genuinely isn't — a banner is not much use to a team that cannot fund the pins. But it should be a decision rather than a surprise.

The finish

800 pins at 1.5 inch, die struck soft enamel, no glitter, proof C2C. Three weeks of sizing decisions, then a super rush to make a 2 July delivery.

Why this one is here

Because most pricing pages talk about volume as though the buyer is a business optimising cost. Here the buyer is a parent trying to keep a team's pins affordable for other parents, and the decision looks completely different from that side.