User Options, such as special sizes and embellishments, pay a fixed royalty of 5%.

[calartcreations]

Hello! I have realized that some of my products in the royalty history on the rate column have two percentages one refers to my fixed royalty and another one is as I read on the notes an extra charge to the customer for use ^ User Options, such as special sizes and embellishments, which pays a fixed royalty of 5%. 

What does this mean? 

Can you get even more benefits from publishing products with specific options?

Thanks in advance for all your thoughts, comments, suggestions, and shared experiences

[Windy]

Sometimes the 5 % is deducted from what you earn. I am not sure when, if ever, 5 % would be added. 

This table does not help with the 5 % issue, but may be helpful to you nonetheless. 

https://community.zazzle.com/t5/tools/earnings-calculator-no-math-required/m-p/8721#M48

[PacifierCity]

Lets take cards as an example:  You design the card and set it to sell with envelope included.  Depending on the card size the envelope cost will vary, but for a 5 x 7 the envelope costs $0.17 cents.  When the card sells and the customer buys the envelope, you earn 5% of the 0.17 cents.  The customer could opt to not buy the card and "save" 0.17 cents.  In this case the cost of the card you published (with envelope) would be 0.17 cents less.  You would earn your royalty from that cost.

I have yet to try and develop a plan that would allow me to account for the changes to the product that a customer would likely make.  Even with years of sales data I don't see a pattern that says to me, design on this to earn a few cents more...  Maybe someone else has and can share...

There are just so many different user option for some products like business cards... rounded corners vs square corners... all the different paper types, the different sizes...  I just design on what makes me happy and let the customer do as they will.  After all, I do get %5 from their changes...

Not very helpful, but that is my perspective...

PC

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[ColsCreations]

Can you get even more benefits from publishing products with specific options?

No. For example, the "base" for throw pillows is the cheapest option - the "zipperless" choice. With a zipper (confusingly labeled as just "polyester"choice) it's $5.75 more. It doesn't matter if you publish it as zipperless or the as more expensive polyester option; either way that $5.75 is calculated as a User-Option. And here's the thing -

User-Options can actually end up costing you.
There are circumstances where the customer selecting the more expensive User-Option upgrade actually results in a lower royalty for you then if they had not selected it. This is because of how Zazzle "does the math" and is most noticeable when something is deeply discounted, like say 50% off. This is because User-Options never reflect discounts in the back-end calculations that determine your earnings. They figure the 5% x non-discounted U$er Option first, then deduct the non-discounted User-Option dollar amount from the total discounted amount the customer paid and whatever remains is what your set royalty is applied to. It's hard to explain without a specific real-life example to map out, so check out this thread/post that should help make it clearer.

[calartcreations]

Thanks everyone for your suggestion and for sharing your knowledge!