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NC CM4 per Order is what an average first order leaves after product, fulfillment, payment, all ad spend, and every per-order fee you’ve configured. It doesn’t include recurring expenses, so treat it as unit economics, not a share of overhead.

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Formula

NC CM4 per Order = ( NC CM2 − NC Marketing order fees − Total Ad Spend − NC Agency Fees order fees − NC Opex order fees − NC Other order fees ) ÷ New Customer Orders

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Formula Components

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How It Works

Upstack computes this in one query from order data and ad spend:
  • The numerator uses costs stored on new customer orders (each customer’s earliest non-cancelled order) plus your total ad spend.
  • The denominator is new customer orders. Each customer has exactly one first order, so this also matches the number of new customers.
  • Recurring expenses and Variable costs are not subtracted. They only reach the dollar NC CM4.
As a result, NC CM4 per Order is usually higher than NC CM4 ÷ new customer orders. The difference is the new customer share of your recurring and variable costs, divided by new customer orders.

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Example

A coffee subscription brand, one month, 1,900 new customer orders: The brand also has $18,000 of monthly recurring expenses. New customers brought in $136,800 of the store’s $342,000 net revenue, a 40% share, so dollar NC CM4 subtracts $7,200 of it (40% × $18,000). That gives $4,124 ($11,324 − $7,200), or $2.17 per new customer order. NC CM4 per Order still shows $5.96.

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How to Interpret It

Read NC CM4 per Order as “first-order margin after everything that scales with orders or ads.” If it’s positive, each additional first order makes money at current ad efficiency. Whether it covers your fixed costs is a question for dollar NC CM4 or store-wide CM4.
  • Close to NC CM3 per Order means your agency, opex, and other costs are mostly recurring rather than per-order.
  • Well below it means per-order fees, such as percentage-of-sales agency fees, are taking a real share of first-order margin.

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Common Pitfalls

  • Comparing it to dollar NC CM4. The two use different cost sets and won’t reconcile when recurring expenses or variable costs exist.
  • Retention ad spend. All ad spend is charged to first orders, including campaigns aimed at existing customers.

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FAQ

NC CM4 per Order leaves out recurring expenses and variable costs. NC CM4 subtracts the new customer share of them. A positive per-order value with a negative total means first orders cover their own costs and all ad spend, but not their share of overhead.
Use NC CM2 per Order for that. NC CM4 per Order already has CAC subtracted, so it tells you the margin left at your current CAC, not the ceiling.
See all Contribution Margin metrics →