Market day break-even calculator
How many sales cover my booth fee, and is this market worth it?
Showing for United States
Items to sell to break even
—
- Sales (customers) to break even
- —
- Sales at break-even
- —
- Costs of the day (booth, travel, other)
- —
- Card fee per item, on average
- —
- Each item leaves you
- —
The card fee per item is an average: your percentage of the price plus your flat fee shared across the items in a typical sale. It is not rounded per sale, so a real day's fees can differ by a few cents. Use your own processor's rate.
Leave the share paid by card empty if every customer pays by card. If some pay cash, enter the share you expect to pay by card.
Profit for the day (negative is a loss)
—
- Result
- —
- Sales
- —
- Card fees
- —
- Cost of the items sold
- —
- Costs of the day (booth, travel, other)
- —
- Items to sell to break even
- —
- Profit per hour of your time
- —
The card fee per item is an average: your percentage of the price plus your flat fee shared across the items in a typical sale. It is not rounded per sale, so a real day's fees can differ by a few cents. Use your own processor's rate.
The profit is before paying yourself. The amount per hour is that profit divided by the hours you enter.
Enter your numbers to see the result.
Planning a farm stand, a CSA or a shop? TallyTill is free to start.
Get started with TallyTill for freeUse this calculator in an AI chat
You can ask Claude, ChatGPT or another AI app to work this out for you, and this calculator opens right inside the chat. You connect TallyTill to your AI app once. It is free, and there is no account and no sign-in.
AI apps call add-ons like this connectors, apps or MCP servers. They all mean the same thing: a way for the AI to use a tool someone else made.
1. Copy this address
2. Add it to your AI app
Claude (claude.ai and the Claude desktop app)
- Open Customize, then Connectors.
- Press + Add, then Add custom connector.
- Name it TallyTill calculators, paste the address and press Continue.
- Under Authentication choose No sign in, then press Add.
- In a new chat, press + at the bottom left, choose Connectors and switch TallyTill calculators on.
On Claude's free plan you can add one custom connector.
ChatGPT
- In Settings, turn on Developer mode. OpenAI moves this switch from time to time; it is usually with the settings for apps and connectors.
- Add a new connector (ChatGPT may call it an app), paste the address and choose No authentication.
- In a new chat, choose TallyTill from the tools menu, or type @ and pick it.
Not every ChatGPT plan lets you add your own connector. If you cannot find the option, your plan may not include it.
Using another AI app? Look in its settings for MCP, add the address as a remote server, and choose no sign-in.
3. Ask your question
Say "use TallyTill", so the AI uses the calculator instead of doing the sum itself. For example:
"Use TallyTill: How many sales cover my booth fee, and is this market worth it?"
What you will see
- The calculator opens in the chat with the numbers you gave already filled in. Change any number and the answer updates.
- If a number is missing, the box is highlighted, or the AI asks you for it in plain words.
- The answer links back to this page, so you can check the working.
- The first time, your AI app asks if it may use TallyTill. Choose Allow.
The calculators take numbers only. They never ask for your name, your email or a password.
How this is worked out
Each item you sell leaves its price, less what it cost you, less its share of the card fee. The card fee per item is an average: your percentage of the price, plus your flat fee per sale divided by the items in a typical sale, times the share of sales paid by card (all of them if you leave it empty). It is not rounded per sale. The items you need to sell are the day's costs (the booth, travel and any other costs) divided by what each item leaves, rounded up to a whole item, and the sales you need are those items divided by the items in a typical sale, rounded up. For a day you are weighing up, the profit is your sales, less the card fees, less what the items cost you, less the day's costs, with each figure rounded to the cent. The amount per hour is that profit divided by the hours the day takes you.
A worked example
Example numbers only; use your own rate. A booth costs 85.00 and getting there 40.00, so the day costs 125.00. An item sells for 6.00 and costs you 2.50, so with no card fee each one leaves 3.50, and you need 125.00 ÷ 3.50 = 35.7, so 36 items. At a card rate of 2.9 percent plus 0.30 a sale, with two items in a typical sale, each item's average fee is 0.174 + 0.15 = 0.324, so each leaves 3.176 and you need 40 items, or 20 sales. If you expect to sell 50 items over an 8-hour day, you make 33.80, or 4.23 an hour. At 30 items the day loses 29.72.
Nothing you type here is saved.