Procurement & finance
Landed Cost
The true total cost of a material delivered to site — the unit price plus freight, insurance, duty, port handling, inland transport, and any financing cost. Comparing suppliers on unit price alone compares the wrong number.
The cheapest quotation frequently loses on landed cost, and the loss can be large: a supplier a continent away wins on price and gives it back in freight, duty and eight weeks of working capital tied up on a ship.
Which is why the Incoterm on a quotation is not a technicality. An EXW price and a DDP price are different numbers describing different obligations, and putting them side by side in a comparison sheet is a category error.