Lip gloss tube and wand MOQ from China:
stock, decorated and private mould.

Five parts, five minimums

Before the numbers, the anatomy. A gloss tube is a tube in PP, PETG or AS (3.5–15 ml, 4.5 ml typical), a cap in ABS or PP, a wand stem in PP, an applicator — doe-foot, flat, plumping, cushion or brush — and a wiper in LDPE or TPE whose bore is set to the wand stem. The tube and cap are usually moulded by one factory, the wand and applicator by a flocking or applicator specialist, the wiper sometimes by a third. A published minimum applies to each part. That matters twice: it explains why a quote for "1,000 gloss tubes" can hide a 3,000-piece applicator, and it is why the applicator is approved with the formula — fibre density changes how a gloss deposits on the lip. Specification detail is on lip packaging.

MOQ by route

Indicative floors reached via partner factories already tooled for small runs; the published industry floor for colour cosmetics components is 5,000–10,000 pieces per item. The buffered column is the number to plan against.

Two lines deserve a note. Moulded-in colour looks cheap on paper — no spray line — but the factory has to purge the machine and run your masterbatch, so the industry floor is 5,000–10,000 and the ~3,000 figure exists only where a partner factory already runs that resin and colour. Electroplating sits at about 10,000 because the plating line is configured for your tone alone; below that, most factories stock plated caps in a handful of standard finishes only. The cross-category picture is on the MOQ index.

Decoration process × minimum on gloss components

The rule that follows: printing is cheap, colour is expensive, metal is expensive and immovable. A clear PETG tube with a black or white stock cap, screen-printed in one colour, launches at around 1,000. A tube in your Pantone with a metallised cap needs 10,000 of the cap whatever the tube does. Process parameters are on the decoration process reference.

Where lead time goes on a decorated gloss

A stock mechanism or tube with decoration ships in about 30–45 days at factory gate. The tube itself is quick — 7–25 days from stock — but decoration is usually outsourced to a sub-contractor with its own queue (5–20 days), the wand and applicator arrive from another line and pass incoming inspection, and the set is assembled and inspected before packing. Multiply by 1.3 for buffer, add 15 days across Chinese New Year, then add freight: typically 18–25 days by sea to the US West Coast, 30–35 to Northern Europe. The ten-node breakdown is on the production calendar and the category cycles on the lead-time index.

What to check before you sign the golden sample

• Cap torque and security — opening torque 0.2–0.7 N·m; the cap stays closed under a 1 kg bag compression; 50 open/close cycles with no product on the thread.
• Wiper fit — the wiper bore set to the wand stem controls the load on the applicator; too loose drips, too tight strips the wand.
• Formula compatibility — tube, wiper, wand and applicator held in your actual bulk at 48°C for 30 days plus ambient and cold controls; no discolouration, swelling, odour or dose drift.
• Decoration adhesion — 3M 600 tape over print and hot stamp, 3M 810 over a 2 mm cross-hatch on spray and plating; no lift.
• Colour — against the signed golden sample under D65 light, ΔE within the agreed tolerance; tube, cap and carton judged side by side.

The full battery is on the QC standards page. For a stock-only launch plan across the whole lip range, read how to launch lip products without a private mould; for the decoration decision in depth, which lipstick decoration forces a high MOQ. The makeup category as a system — lipstick, gloss, compacts, foundation — is on the makeup packaging solution, and the supplier questions that expose a hidden applicator minimum are on how to evaluate a China packaging supplier.

Common questions