Landed cost calculator for clothing imports from Bangladesh

The FOB price is what you pay for the goods, loaded and cleared for export at the port in Bangladesh. Landed cost is what those goods actually cost once they reach your warehouse: the FOB price plus sea or air freight, insurance, import duty, customs clearance, port charges and inland delivery. How wide the gap is depends mostly on the duty rate and the freight. In the worked example on this page, 1,000 t-shirts at an example price of US$5.00 with US$900 of freight, landed cost is about 24% above the FOB price into the UK at 0% duty and 50% above it into the US at the 26.5% cotton t-shirt rate, by our arithmetic; run your own forwarder’s sea or air quote through the calculator for yours. That matters when you compare Bangladesh with a nearshore supplier, because a higher FOB price with lower freight and duty can beat a lower FOB price. It also matters for pricing: retail margins built on an FOB number rather than a landed number tend to disappear the first time duty and freight land on the same invoice. Ask any supplier to quote FOB and DDP side by side.

It depends on the country, and it changes the number more than people expect. The EU and UK use a CIF basis, meaning duty is calculated on the goods value plus the cost of freight and insurance to the border, so expensive freight increases the duty bill even when the rate stays the same. Several other countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, assess duty on the goods value alone, with international freight and insurance excluded. This calculator follows that split: the United Kingdom, European Union, Japan and Gulf options, and a rate you enter yourself, use the CIF method, while the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand options charge duty on the goods value alone. It shows the duty line separately so you can see the effect. When the amounts are large enough to matter, ask your customs broker which valuation basis applies to your product and destination, and whether any additional tariffs apply on top of the normal rate.

It is as accurate as the figures you put into it. The arithmetic is simple and correct, but three inputs move the result: the freight quote, which changes with season, route and container fill; the duty rate, which depends on your exact product code and any additional tariffs in force; and clearance costs, which vary by broker and port. Use it to test scenarios rather than to sign contracts: what happens to your margin if freight doubles, or if duty returns to 12% in the EU after preferences end. For a firm number, ask your freight forwarder for a rate on your actual volume and your customs broker for the duty rate on your HTS codes, then run those figures here. We can also quote DDP, which converts all of it into one price per piece.

No. The landed cost calculator leaves import VAT and GST out, on the assumption that a registered business recovers them, so they affect cash flow, not cost. Accounting rules treat recoverable tax the same way: IAS 2, as published in the EU’s Official Journal in September 2023, counts import duties and other taxes in the cost of stock, except those the business later recovers from the tax authority. In the UK, GOV.UK guidance updated in June 2025 lets a VAT-registered importer declare and recover import VAT on the same VAT Return, without paying it upfront at import and without needing approval. If you are not registered, or cannot reclaim the tax, it is a real cost: ask your customs broker for the amount on your shipment and add it to the clearance and delivery field, so it reaches the cost per piece. Check your own position with an accountant before you set retail prices.

Use six inputs and one rule for the duty base, which is all our landed cost calculator does. Put the price per piece in B1, the pieces in B2, total freight in B3, insurance as a percentage of the goods in B4, the duty rate in B5 and clearance with inland delivery in B6. Goods value is B1 multiplied by B2, and insurance is that figure multiplied by B4. For the United Kingdom, European Union, Japan and Gulf options, and for a rate you type in yourself, the calculator charges duty on goods plus freight plus insurance; for the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand options it charges duty on the goods value alone. Landed cost per piece is goods, freight, insurance, duty and clearance added together, then divided by B2. There is no download, but a sheet built this way gives the same answer. Confirm the duty rate and base for your product code with your customs broker.

As used here, a landed cost factor is the landed cost per piece divided by the price per piece you pay the supplier, a multiplier for estimating other styles on the same route. Our landed cost calculator does not show it, but it is one division. With the figures the calculator opens with, an example price of 5.00, 1,000 pieces, 900 freight, 0.5% insurance, 250 clearance and the United Kingdom option at 0% duty, the result is 6.18 a piece. The factor is 6.18 divided by 5.00, or about 1.24: every 1.00 of goods costs 1.24 landed, an uplift of 24%. Choose the option for your own rate, which opens at 12%, and the same shipment gives 6.89 and a factor of about 1.38. A factor only holds while price, quantity and route stay similar, because freight and clearance are fixed sums that weigh more on cheap garments and small shipments. Recalculate it for each shipment from your forwarder’s quote.

Yes: under international accounting rules the landed cost is the cost your stock is recorded at, and it becomes cost of goods sold when the garments are sold. IAS 2, as published in the EU’s Official Journal in September 2023, says the costs of purchase comprise the purchase price, import duties and taxes that cannot be recovered, and transport, handling and other costs directly attributable to buying the goods. Our landed cost calculator’s lines fall under those headings: goods, freight, insurance, duty, clearance and delivery. The standard excludes selling costs and storage outside production, and the calculator also stops at your warehouse door. Stock is measured at the lower of cost and net realisable value, and that amount becomes an expense in the period the sale is recognised. Record the calculator’s cost per piece against each style, and ask your accountant how your national rules apply, since they can differ from IAS 2.

For a CIF quote, enter the CIF price per piece in the landed cost calculator’s first field, set freight and insurance to zero and keep clearance and delivery; for a DDP quote there is nothing to calculate. Finnish Customs’ 2024 summary of the ICC’s Incoterms 2020 rules says that under CIF the seller pays freight and insurance to the named port of destination, and under DDP the seller pays freight, insurance and customs formalities to the destination. On the United Kingdom, European Union, Japan and Gulf options, duty is then worked out on the CIF figure. The United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand options charge duty on the goods alone, so where duty is due a CIF price overstates it slightly: ask for freight and insurance to be shown separately. Compare a DDP quote directly with the calculator’s result, and check whether import VAT is inside it. We quote FOB, CIF and DDP, so ask for the terms you want side by side.

Landed cost for apparel is the price paid for the garments plus everything it takes to get them into your warehouse: freight, insurance, import duty, customs fees, clearance and inland delivery; divided by the pieces in the shipment, it gives the landed cost per piece. For the United States two customs fees sit beside the duty. On CBP’s user fee table, as at October 2026, the merchandise processing fee on a formal entry is 0.3464% of the value, with a minimum of US$34.58 and a maximum of US$670.86 per entry. The harbor maintenance fee is 0.125% of the value of cargo loaded on or unloaded from a commercial vessel at a US port, so it applies to sea shipments, not air freight. In the worked example on this page, 1,000 t-shirts at an example price of US$5.00, the goods are worth US$5,000. By our arithmetic, 0.3464% of that is US$17.32, below the minimum, so the processing fee is US$34.58; by sea the harbor fee is US$6.25; together about US$0.04 a piece. Our landed cost calculator has no separate line for these fees, so add them to the clearance and delivery field with your broker’s charge. Duty remains the large line, at the rate the calculator’s US presets show. Confirm the rate and the fees for your own HTS codes with your customs broker.