Lumper Fees

Lumper fees are outsourced labor charges levied by wholesalers and distributors simply for the physical movement of pallets of products between or within warehouses.

In the beverage industry, these fees represent a granular example of the “death by a thousand cuts” facing independent brands in the supply chain. Along with slotting-fees-beverage-industry and manufacturer-chargebacks, lumper fees obscure the true cost of retail distribution and severely erode the net profit margins of functional beverage manufacturers, despite the high gross margins seen at the retail shelf. Heritage conglomerates are often able to bypass these fees by leveraging their massive, vertically integrated wholesale networks.