The small-tube end of Daler-Rowney's Simply range: 12 ml tubes in a hanging orange carton, sold as twelve colours or twenty-four. Both boxes print the size on the front — 12 x 12ml and 24 x 12ml, each marked 0.4 US fl. oz — so the count and the volume are on the pack rather than in a listing.

Between the two sizes the larger box is the better buy, though not dramatically. Twelve tubes are Rs. 3,000, which is Rs. 250 a tube; twenty-four are Rs. 5,300, which is Rs. 220.83. Doubling the colour count costs 77% more, so the 24 saves you about Rs. 29 on every tube. In per-millilitre terms that is Rs. 20.83 against Rs. 18.40.

Those are high numbers, and it is worth being straight about why. This is the most expensive way to buy Daler-Rowney Simply paint on our shelf. The same range in large 75 ml tubes — our Simply pack of 6 — is Rs. 12.89 a millilitre, and the ten-pot Simply tube of 18 ml pots is Rs. 14.25. Small tubes always cost more per millilitre, and here the penalty is around 45%.

What the small boxes buy instead is colour range at a low entry price and a package that hangs on a hook and fits in a school bag. Twenty-four ready-made colours in a carton the size of a paperback is a genuinely different proposition from six large tubes, and for a student who wants to try acrylic without mixing, it is the right one. Just do not buy it expecting it to be the cheap option.

The tubes are the standard Simply plastic tubes with black caps, seated in two clear strips inside the carton, and the range mark sits in its grey circle on the front with the panel printed in English, French, German and Spanish.

We list this set from 10 years up. The Safencia price starts at Rs. 3,000 with Cash on Delivery across Pakistan. Stock, the size you want, your city and delivery charges are confirmed on WhatsApp before dispatch.

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