Supply Schedule: From Intuition to Definition

Imagine you run a small stall selling lemonade. On a hot day, you might be willing to sell 50 glasses at ₹10 each. But if the price jumps to ₹20, you'd happily make and sell 100 glasses — maybe even stay open longer. If the price drops to ₹5, you'd barely bother, selling only 10 glasses.

That relationship — "at this price, I will supply this much" — is the core idea. A supply schedule is simply a table that records this pairing: for each possible price, it shows the quantity a seller is willing and able to offer for sale.

The Precise Statement

A supply schedule is a tabular statement that shows the different quantities of a commodity that a firm (or an industry) is willing and able to offer for sale at different possible prices, during a given period of time, ceteris paribus (all other factors held constant).

There are two types:

A Concrete Example

Individual Supply Schedule (Lemonade Stall)

Notice the pattern: as price rises, quantity supplied rises. This is the Law of Supply — the direct, positive relationship between price and quantity supplied, visible directly in the schedule. …