• name...Nick
• who is asking the question (other)
Using the calculation on your website,
if I sell something for $885 and my cost
is $296, I make $589 profit. How do I calculate the profit percent
I made on that transaction?
• Profit as a percentage of what it cost me?
• Profit as a percentage of what I sold it for?
Also, how do I calculate
the "mark up" percentage from cost($296)
to sell($855)?
• e.g. $296 x ______% = $855
Also, how do I calculate the "discount" percentage from sell($855)
to cost($296)?
• e.g. $855 x ______% = $296
Thank you,
and looking forward to your answers.
Hi Nick,
From the way you ask the question I think that you understand what the problem is. We quite often say percent without saying percent of what. You certainly can express the profit of $589 as a percentage of what it cost you
589/296
100 = 199% of what it cost you
or as a percentage of what you sold it for
589/855
If you said to me "My profit on this item was xx%"I would probably think that you meant xx% of what it cost you, but you might be thinking "I just sold that item to you for $855 and 69% of that amount is my profit." It's the sloppy way we use the language that is the problem.
For markup you added $589 to the $296 it cost you, so the markup is $589. You then have
$296 x ______% = $589
The missing number is 589/296 100
= 199% so the markup is 199% of what it cost you.
For your expression
$855 x ______% = $296
the missing number is 296/855 100
= 35%, so your cost is 35% of the selling price.
This is probably not the definitive answer you were looking for but the language of percent is confusing at times.
Penny