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Jars and lids

Single serve, and the formats buyers ask for

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Two formats get asked for once you are selling to anyone other than a person eating it at home: single serve for hospitality, and small sizes for gifting. One of them is a different business and one is just a smaller jar.

Gift and sampler sizes

Small formats sell on occasion rather than on consumption, which makes them a different business from the standard jar even though the product is identical. They move at times of year when the main line does not.

A 4 oz jar is the same product in a smaller container, processed the same way. It costs more per ounce to fill, sells in multiples, and is the format that moves at Christmas and at weddings.

4 oz Clear Glass Straight Sided Jar
4 oz · 58-400 · Glass · case of 84
The sampler size. Filled and processed exactly like the retail jar, just more of them per batch.
$0.78
each
See it

Single serve for hospitality

This channel buys on consistency and portion control rather than on flavor, which changes what you are competing on and usually what you can charge.

Portion packs and tubs are a different operation: sealed under a film, usually not retorted in a jar, and generally made by a copacker rather than in a licensed kitchen. If a hotel asks, the realistic answer is a copacker, which is on having someone else make it.

Bulk for bakery

A 32 oz jar or a pail, sold by weight with no retail label. This is often the most profitable format because the packaging cost per ounce collapses and nobody is paying for presentation.

What not to do

One format gets asked for regularly and is a poor fit for this product, for reasons about the set rather than about the container. A product designed to hold its shape does not dispense well, and no amount of packaging solves that.

Do not put a processed product into a format you have not processed in. The published process times are for specific jar sizes, and a different container is a different thermal problem.

References

United States Department of Agriculture. Complete Guide to Home Canning, Guide 7: Preparing and Canning Jams and Jellies (rev. 07/2015). National Center for Home Food Preservation. nchfp.uga.edu
Our own catalog. Capacities, neck finishes, materials, case packs and prices on this page are read from the products we actually stock, not from a published source.
Written from federal regulation and published extension guidance, not from a laboratory. A standard of identity is a federal floor and your state adds to it. Anything here is a starting point for a conversation with your state department of agriculture, not a determination that you comply.