Catalog Items vs Bundles vs Packages

The problem

Most MSPs know what they sell. Fewer can explain exactly what each bundle costs to deliver and why.

The common pattern looks like this: you build a spreadsheet with line items, mix together licenses, labor, and client-facing descriptions, and end up with rows that blur the line between "what we pay for," "what we promise the client," and "how we package the deal." When a vendor raises prices, you can't tell which bundles are affected without re-reading every row on every contract. When a client asks why their monthly bill went up, you're back in the spreadsheet trying to reverse-engineer your own math (or worse… someone else's math!) And when you swap out a tool (replacing your backup vendor or antivirus provider) you're editing contracts even though the client's experience hasn't changed.

This happens because the spreadsheet treats everything as the same kind of thing. ClarityCalc doesn't.

The concepts

ClarityCalc splits your catalog into three distinct layers, each with a specific job.

Catalog Items: What you, the MSP, pay for

A catalog item represents a cost input: a license, a tool, or a platform your MSP purchases to deliver value.

Examples: antivirus licenses, backup software, monitoring agents, compliance platforms.

Catalog items carry a unit cost, which is the price you pay per unit per month. An AV license at $1.50/endpoint, a backup agent at $3.90/server, an email security gateway at $2.10/mailbox…. and so on. In ClarityCalc, catalog items can also have a client-facing description that presents the "solution you're delivering" without exposing the specific license, vendor, or tool you're using to deliver it. Internally you see "Datto AV"; the client sees "Antivirus protection for user workstations."

Catalog items can be added to a plan on their own in ClarityCalc, or be packaged inside a bundle depending on what the MSP is delivering and how they wish to explain it.

Bundles: A deliverable involving human labor or expertise

A bundle represents a commitment your MSP delivers. It's a line item the client sees on a Statement of Work and can be made up of just labor, or labor and the tools required to do the job.

Examples: Help Desk Support, Monthly Compliance Consulting, Technical Alignment Management

Bundles describe an outcome without promising a specific qty of hours per month or specific catalog items. A bundle like "Vulnerability Scanning" might rely on three different catalog items and two hours of specialized maintenance, but the client sees one line: the bundle name, a description, and a price.

Bundles do not own cost directly. Instead, ClarityCalc derives a bundle's cost from the catalog items and labor roles you attach to it, then applies your organization's default margin to calculate the price. If your Help Desk Support bundle uses 0.15 hours/user/month of Help Desk labor at $45/hr burdened, and includes a $1.50/user RMM agent, ClarityCalc calculates:

Labor cost:    0.15 hrs × $45.00 = $6.75/user/month
Catalog item cost:  $1.50/user/month
Total cost:    $8.25/user/month
At 50% margin: $8.25 ÷ (1 − 0.50) = $16.50/user/month price

Change the RMM vendor and the cost updates automatically, giving you reports on margin drift. The client's bundle description stays the same.

Packages: how you package the deal

A package is an internal template that groups bundles and catalog items you commonly sell together. Packages save you time, and are usually built to represent offerings like "MSP Bronze/Silver/Gold." Items cannot be removed from a package on a plan-by-plan basis, cutting down on inconsistency between clients.

A package is different from a bundle because the composition of a package is shown on client facing documents, whereas a bundle rolls up to a single line item. For example, a "Standard Managed IT" package might show the client:

• Workstation Antivirus
• Workstation Patching
• Email Spam Filter
• Email VIP Impersonation Protection
• … And so on

Packages exist so you don't rebuild the same structure for every client. Select a package when building a plan, and all its bundles and catalog items populate at once. This gives your team confidence with everything from sales and quoting to deployment to monitoring to finance.

Individual bundles and catalog items can be added to a plan independently of a package, and they're cleanly marked as "standalone" so everyone is clear on bundle delivery expectations.

How it works in ClarityCalc

The cost-to-document chain

• A Catalog Item can contain:
  • One catalog item
• Labor can contain
  • One burden rate
• A Bundle can contain:
  • One or many Catalog Items AND/OR
  • One or many Labor entries
• A Package can contain:
  • One or many Catalog Items AND/OR
  • One or Many Bundles
• A Plan can contain:
  • One or many Catalog Items AND/OR
  • One or Many Bundles AND/OR
  • One or many Packages

When ClarityCalc generates a Statement of Work for a Plan:

1. Every Catalog Item and Bundle description appears (if it was marked "client visible")
2. Catalog item descriptions appear only if the catalog item is attached directly to a package or plan, not if it's used internally by a bundle.
3. Package names appear as groupings of Catalog Items and Bundles

This means you control exactly what the client sees. Show capabilities when they matter. Hide implementation details when they would only add confusion.

Worked example: Monthly Compliance add-on

Your MSP sells a compliance add-on. Internally it includes a compliance platform license, vCIO review time, and technical account management time.

In ClarityCalc, you might choose to model it like this:

Cost breakdown per user per month:

vCIO labor:    0.10 hrs × $95.00  =  $9.50
TAM labor:     0.05 hrs × $65.00  =  $3.25
Platform:      $8.50
Total cost:    $21.25/user/month
At 45% margin: $21.25 ÷ (1 − 0.45) = $38.64/user/month price

The client sees:

• "Ongoing compliance oversight, reporting, and guidance" (the bundle)
• "Compliance management tooling and reporting access" (the catalog item, because it's directly in the package)

The client does not see: vendor names, labor breakdowns, or hourly rates.

For a client with 35 users, the compliance add-on contributes $1,352.40/month in revenue at $743.75/month in cost. That's a 45% margin you can see and your account managers can defend.

Design decisions

Why can't labor be sold on its own? Because ClarityCalc is not a project quoting system or block-hours tracking system. While some MSPs choose to bill block of time directly, this is not the problem ClarityCalc aims to solve at this time.

Why are catalog item descriptions only shown when the catalog item is directly on a package or plan? This gives you precise control. When a catalog item is attached to a bundle, it's an internal cost input. Your carpenter doesn't list the cost of replacing his hammer, you just trust him to appropriately charge you for the tools he needs. The same philosophy applies to bundles in ClarityCalc. The client description covers what the user actually cares about, and associating the cost of the tools means your sales people won't under-quote a complicated bundle. When you attach a catalog item directly to a package, it's because you're deliberately choosing to surface that solution to the client.

Why is bundle cost derived instead of entered directly? Because cost-up pricing is the whole point. If you type in a bundle price, you're guessing at margin. When ClarityCalc derives price from labor + catalog items + margin, you know exactly what the margin is and exactly what changes if a vendor raises their rates.