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Help with pricing
Hi folks, despite the fact ive been a member for 4 years i am a relative newbie to this game. Mostly ive been cuttinf and fitting wall art and an occasion car or window basic sign. Ive been asked to quote on , what for me is quite a big job. Its 4 8ft square windows for a tattoo shop .the font has a shadow and im not too sure how to price the job. I have a book to read through but i was meant to quote the job on Friday and would like to give him a definate answer by Monday but im not even sure how long the job is going to take me to add that into the quote. Your help would be massively appreciated.[/img]
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14 Replies
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128 people had a look but no one willing to help…..
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Craig, I was one of them that looked & it wasn’t a case of not wanting to help but simply that I never seem to be able to get pricing right myself, when people have asked in the past what I would probably charge has been way lower than the sort of price others were giving.
If I had to quote a job like this I would probably work out how much vinyl was needed for the job & work out the price based on x metres of vinyl fitted.Sorry I can’t be more help
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Thanks anyway Martin, your reply was as much appreciated as an answer. In every job ive ever done from building work to labouring ive always been bad at puting a fair price on my work and as Phill said in his book id hate to badly underprice a job like this and leave customers thinking that all signwriters should be pricing jobs as low as i might. Martin, when you do a shadow do you charge full price for the shadow or perhaps a third, amongst other aspects thats one that im not sure about.
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I’m not the best person to speak to when it comes to pricing as I’ve already said Craig lol.
Generally speaking if I use a shadow or outline for text I would fit one colour on top of the other, if I am doing that then yes the second colour would be a lower price per metre fitted, don’t think I would go as low as a third though. -
Thanks Martin, im sure given time and a few mistakes ill get there. Cheers.
Just dont want Graham Shand to be correct and i get weggied on this one. lol
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I think the problem with asking for advice on pricing is that everyone prices differently. If you -like me- are fairly new to this and you ask someone who has been doing it for 20 odd years how long it should take, they might say an hour but for a newbie it will probably take a lot longer. You price it for an hour and end up losing a fortune, see what i mean. Plus there may not be many people willing to discuss pricing with a competitor.
Possibly the easiest way to price it is work out ALL your costs, materials, time designing, time spent measuring up, time to fit etc. You should have an idea of what your hourly rate is. Add your total time cost to your material cost. If anything over estimate your time to cover yourself for any hold ups etc. -
Pricing is the least appreciated and possibly the most difficult aspect of the game we are in.
Nobody wants to be cheap, we want to get a fair return for our skills and effort and do a good job.. Pricing in this game works as follows.You can be good and cheap but you wont be fast.
You can be good and fast but you wont be cheap
You can be fast and cheap but you wont be good.This is true as night follows day.
You simply have to position yourself at the level you want to operate. Your customers will find their own level. Your bottom line is hours + materials etc… As long as you cover those you have a business.
Simon.
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quote :someone who has been doing it for 20 odd years how long it should take, they might say an hour but for a newbie it will probably take a lot longer. You price it for an hour and end up losing a fortune, see what i mean.Unfortunately you cannot expect your potential customers to pay for your slow installations while you are gaining experience, its simply not going to work and you will not be competitive.
Craig you may find it helpful to simply work out a Square metre charge for cut vinyl and or printed vinyl ( square metre of cut vinyl : cut, weeded, prepped and installed = £xx.xx ) this will give you a figure from which you can start from and adjust accordingly when taking all the other variables into consideration.
Best of luck on winning the job.
Dave.
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An invaluable guide is the Price-it sign guide, it gives an approx. cost of pretty much all day to day sign jobs, it helped me out a huge amount..
Here’s *cough one for sale for very little money…
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Thanks for the input guys, ill be delivering the quote in a few hours and will find out soon enough whether ive priced it right.
Simon, i certainly wont be fast and the other verbs could be changed to suit me.
Dave, tha fact that i WILL be slower than most seasoned signwriters is one aspect of why i was looking for help, i dont know how many hours this will take but i wouldnt dream of charging the customer for my failings in that regard, i know from a van that i did that i was way below in what i charged for the job, im just trying not to tip the scales in the other direction and overprice and lose the job.
James, how much do you want for it and do you accept paypal?Ill let you know whether he does a Suarez and bites my hand off or chases me out the shop.
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I often work out a price, then to check i take my material costs and times by 3 (an old trick i learnt when i first started in this industry). It doesn’t work for everything but for the majority of vinyl jobs it will give you a rough idea of what price you should be charging.
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Paypal is fine, and if you are happy to cover postage and a pint its yours!
Price It charge £4 postage so plus a pint, £7?
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When I first started I would work out what I thought was a reasonable price & then phone a couple of local sign companies & get a price from them, or get someone to phone for me, most people would give a ball park figure over the phone which was enough to see if I was in the right sort of area.
Dave is right why should your customers/potential customers pay extra while you learn the game, I’m a lot slower than I should be because of health problems but I don’t charge my customers extra for my failings. I work my time out on what I know it should take to do the job, not what it actually takes me.
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As James said the Price It sign guide is invaluable when starting out.
I tend to use it on a daily basis and have grown to trust it by checking my prices now and again in all the other ways people have suggested.
Some jobs i work out cost of vinyl and add time to do job, other times I use the x3 materials etc, etc, and usually find whatever method things are in the same area or if it looks too litte it usually is and is not worthwhile.
From the price guide a simple method is to charge 10p per cm per letter and see where that gets you. This usually works out a bit more than a per sqm pricing so works in your favour unless quoting against the competion !!
Anything that requires printing I usually buy in from a trade printer and then mark up anything between 55% to 100% depending on the size of the job.
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