2 Small Van Price Check

[Kevin Flowers]

David
i would be looking £185 + vat, your pricing is fora single colour job

Kev

[David Hammond]

😮 That sounds a lot to me.

There is quite a bit of work piecing the logo & text together.

I am trying to find out what he paid for his bigger vans to do a comparison.

[Gary Birch]

We’d be the same kind of area as Kev for the combo and about £160 for the Connect.

As Kev has said £135 is too cheap unless a single colour design

Cheers

Gary

[Jill Marie Welsh]

£450 here in cut cast vinyl.
I’ve been charging £130 for two regular pickup truck doors since about 2000.
Love….Jill

[Hugh Potter]

Are you talking $ or £ Jill?

I’d be looking around the £180-220 mark.

i think any van for under £200 is too cheap!

[Jill Marie Welsh]

I used the dollars to pounds converter.
Van would be $700 and up, two truck doors are $195 from my shop.
A van with one color lettering is $500 from me.
(about £325)

[Neil Davey]

Way too cheap, I’ve roughly guestimated the amount of vinyl and also you’ve got the layering to do so £220 – £240 is a fair price.
As the old saying goes they’ll make a lot more money out the signs than you.

[Jill Marie Welsh]

Here here Neil! (or is that hear hear)
If a customer balks at the price I ask them what they are spending for a yearly YP ad.
Van lettering is 24/7 advertising for at least 5 years.

[David Hammond]

There’s some fairly large price differences:

£160-£240

At least I know I can charge that bit more.

This customer is a on the other side of town so don’t know what competition is like over there. They might be able to charge more.

I am worried about going in too expensive and looking an idiot, and more worried about being too cheap and word spreading.

[Hugh Potter]

about a year ago I decided to stop trying to price my work to compete, I now just do what the price is, I have a linear metre vinyl cost (retail) which I charge per colour, min 1m, including tape it’s around £18pm for 610, i then charge my hourly rate for installation. so if it’s 10m of vinyl + 4hrs install it’ll be £280, I don’t bother making it something it’s not, I have a value and thats where I aim to work at, sometimes i’ll even add on because it looks too cheap.

i’m busier now than ever.

[David Hammond]

Thats a good idea hugh.

I get customers come into the shop wanting their van doing.

‘How much’ they ask.

‘what is it you want on the van?’

‘Company name, what I do, phone number, web address and e-mail’

‘Will that all be in the same colour?’

‘I don’t know depends on the cost’

My point been, using your method you can’t give an accurate price until you know the design to work out material.

The design is done, the price is in, and the client says it’s too expensive then what?

I don’t take a deposit until I give a written quote. I personally wouldn’t give anyone a penny until I knew the final price and had it in writing.

Lately I have given customers the ‘worse case scenario’ price. IE: it will not cost more than that.

I’ve still not the hang of quotes. If I am buying in materials I have my markup. If I am buying in from ashbys or similar I have my markup. But actually pricing a sign/vehicle really does take me ages… and I am forever doubting myself.

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

Dave, it’s worth whatever you price it at. There are definitely regional differences here. Me personally I would be looking in the £250-300 region. But if what you price fits with your business model then that’s also fine.

It’s all relative. Hugh has hit the nail on the head. Forget competition, because you end up being your own competition. They buy You first!

When someone comes to me looking for a quote, I get the job it’s very rare that I don’t (but I don’t expect to get them all)… I just have a lot of confidence in my business and product… that’s what will get you the sale mate.

You can get the sale before giving a written quote, then when you get the artwork signed off they sign the price off at the same time. Written quotes are too easy to walk away with saying "i’ll think about it" (for me anyway) agree the price, do the artwork and take the money! then do the job 😉

Once you get the hang of it, the fear will go I promise. Most customers don’t really want to shop around, if you think about it, for most trades people (think about it from your perspective) 3-4 hours gathering quotes is 3-4 hours of money lost so even if the find one £80 cheaper than yours, chances are they will actually be paying more in the long run!… (that’s a good sales close)

I often give the customer £20-25 back when they collect, and tell them I got a good deal on the vinyl, they love that, youd be surprised how far that goes. Or I put a few freebies on the passenger seat that lead to other sales such as labels, mugs of a few tshirts with their company logo on. 1 in 3 come back and spend more money buying larger quantities of the freebies!

Now suck up mate, add 25% on and close the deal (you can always come down, but you can’t really go up, unless your up selling of course)

Go get em Tiger!

[Hugh Potter]

HI David,

(well said Mo.. btw!)

you are correct, I need to have a rough idea of the design to be able to quote using my method, however, it works for me.

I usually have a rough idea in mind and rarely will I give an ‘off the top of my head’. I tell them there’s no point me doing that as I can say "£250 mate" and have some cut vinyl and a logo in mind, where as they have 20 colours and 5sq mtr of digi print in mind!

despite people not liking it on the whole, I usually have the time to throw together a rough idea of what i can do for them, then give them an approximate costing based on the economy vinyls (oracle 551), they then have options fo upgrade to longer life vinyls etc if they are planning to keep the van more than 3-4 years.

If I really have to give a price with no design in mind, then it’s "between £200 and £2000 mate", how much you got to spend?

deposits i’ll take once they’re happy, okay… I have to spend more time than I like on some jobs but if they’re paying the going rate and not trying to haggle the price to death, then it’s all part of the service.

you will get the hang of doing quotes. I surprised myself the other day by doing a rough estimated quote there and then with a pencil and a note pad, I knew the prices of the panel and they wanted single colour vinyl… easy to work out.

keep at it, it’s only taken me 5+ yrs! actually, it was my business’s official 6th birthday on the 5th of this month!!

[David Hammond]

Cheers Hugh and Mo.

It’s my companies 1st birthday on the 1st November. 😀

I suppose quoting gets easier with the more jobs you do. Those iconic vans/customers stick in your mind and you remember what you charged them.

I need to work out how I am going to price vehicles and then work out some ball park figures.

[David Hammond]

Done some market research.

Other sign co’s near to where this company operates are quoting £150-£160 + VAT.

I’ll probably quote around the £160 mark. As said I can come down not go up and there’s some travel involved. (hoping to do both vans in 1 day)

[Denise Goodfellow]

Hi David

We have a print out of a small van, medium sized and large. each van each has a visual of simple, medium, complex design on them. Along with an allotted price.

Its quite handy when a customer doesn`t know what he wants, I show him the book with the printouts in. It gives them an idea of what they will get for a certain price.

I always try to cover my butt ( and its a big butt LOL) by saying the price might increase depending upon the final design.

Sometimes if they add another phone number etc, I let them have it for free…. But I`m quite quick to add "idiot tax"

[Martin Pearson]

He’s already been told to do that Denise but obviously hasn’t listened :lol1: :lol1:

I am starting to believe he must have been an Officer when he was in the RN as they never listen either :lol1: :lol1: :lol1:

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

quote Martin:

I am starting to believe he must have been an Officer when he was in the RN as they never listen either :lol1: :lol1: :lol1:

OWCH!

One good thing I learn’t in the RM’s "Listen all the time, just in case it’s not you they want"

[David Hammond]

I have listened, and do have a folder with some samples of signs in.

Not done many vehicles so don’t have a vast collection designs, and haven’t found time to sit and put some spoof ones together.

I am a strong believer of letting the customer see what they’re getting. Makes the sale much easier.

[Martin Pearson]

OK so it was a bit cruel but smile David, i was joking honest :lol1: :lol1: :lol1:

You can’t have it both ways, but by having a basic, intermediate and complex design for a spoof company with prices gives you a starting point for a proper design for the customer.

I get customers come into the shop wanting their van doing.

‘How much’ they ask.

‘what is it you want on the van?’

‘Company name, what I do, phone number, web address and e-mail’

‘Will that all be in the same colour?’

‘I don’t know depends on the cost’

So show them the designs you have in the book and you have something that they can actually see and help them decide what they would really like. The cheap skates will always go for the one colour design with just basic details no matter what you say but customers that are unsure or want a better looking image that is more likely to get noticed will have a better idea how much something along the lines of what they want will cost.

Once you have decided what your customers budget is then you know what price design you are working on and can design to suit that budget. The customer already knows what the price is so when the design is done it should be quite straight forward.

[Jill Marie Welsh]

Try offering a three tiered pricing system (in my case it would be for cut vinyl or painted as I do not have a printer)
Such as:
Regular sized van (not a sprinter)
One color, name, phone number, website (not an email)
short laundry list no pictorial $500
Two to three colors, same info $650
Fully tarted up with a pictorial and same info $750 and up
That would be both sides, something on the bonnet, and the back of the van.
Usually most customers choose the middle option.
Not enough time to convert to pounds.
I don’t compete with others either, I don’t give a sh!t what they charge.
My vans look better and people like them, therefore they usually go to me even if I cost more.

[David Hammond]

I’ve taken on board everything said.

As this will lead to more work, I used my market research and prices suggested here and got the job. :lol1:

I am extremely happy. Got myself a job which will lead to future work (the whole idea of the networking) and charged more than what I would have.

You’ve given me a new found confidence in charging what I deserve, rather than what will guarantee the job.

When I get 5 mins I will do as I did with the signs, and put together some samples and have a tier system.

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

quote David Hammond:

I’ve taken on board everything said.

As this will lead to more work, I used my market research and prices suggested here and got the job. :lol1:

I am extremely happy. Got myself a job which will lead to future work (the whole idea of the networking) and charged more than what I would have.

You’ve given me a new found confidence in charging what I deserve, rather than what will guarantee the job.

When I get 5 mins I will do as I did with the signs, and put together some samples and have a tier system.

YAY…. well done mate…. seasy innit?

😀 😀 😀 😀 😀 😀 😀

[David Hammond]

I wouldn’t call it easy yet.

I suppose having the tools in place make life easier.

Really need to get some photos of my work. People like to see what they get for their pounds.

[Martin Pearson]

David, glad to hear you got the work and your happy, confidence is a big part of any business BUT……….. how did you do your market research?? How do you know what the other companies would have charged for this job and more importantly are they any good??

Something that happened to me a few years ago made me realise that it didn’t really matter what the other guy was charging unless the customer was driven by price alone and to be honest I don’t really want that sort of customer anyway.
I had done a visual for a customer and he seemed delighted with it, went away to speak to wife about the job. Got a phone call the next day from him asking if I could drop the price a bit as another signmaker could do his van £30 cheaper.
Now I had had enough of this keep dropping my prices as I never mark them up in the first place so this time I said No sorry that’s the bottom line and I’m afraid not. Guy said he really wanted to give me the work and if I could match the other guys price the job was mine, he really wanted me to do it but needed to save the £30.
No sorry I said, you got a very good price to start with and I am afraid I can’t do it any cheaper……….. The guys next statement kind of threw me a bit because his exact words were "but his design is sh*t" :lol1: :lol1:
I kid you not that’s exactly what he said, I am afraid to say I just lost it and hung up straight away.
Two mins latter the phone rings and he says we must have got cut off. I did end up doing the van for the price I wanted but it made me think about all the jobs I had done far to cheaply because I just gave in and dropped my price. If someone likes your designs then they will pay more for them, isn’t always easy to get what you want but if you can afford to walk away from the job it is a lot easier.

[Jill Marie Welsh]

quote Martin:

I did end up doing the van for the price I wanted but it made me think about all the jobs I had done far to cheaply because I just gave in and dropped my price. If someone likes your designs then they will pay more for them, isn’t always easy to get what you want but if you can afford to walk away from the job it is a lot easier.

:thumbsup:

Glad you are taking good advice on board, kid.

[Denise Goodfellow]

[quote="Martin"]
No sorry I said, you got a very good price to start with and I am afraid I can’t do it any cheaper……….. The guys next statement kind of threw me a bit because his exact words were "but his design is sh*t" :lol1: :lol1:

/quote]

At least your customer can see that a good design matters.

I find this very frustrating, when another sign maker drops the price and produces cr@p…. and the stupid £ cruncher customer cannot see past the £sign. All they see ( well most of them) is the final price, how can they not see that the design or quality of the items produced is for their benefit in the long run….

I am alittle disheartened with part of the industry at the moment…. 🙁

[Martin Pearson]

Denise, I’ve been down the road of dropping prices to match other peoples prices and turning out cheap rubbish because that was what the customer wanted.
OK so I am in a slightly better position than most now in that I have a pension from the RN which means that I don’t have to rely on business 100% for my income and can turn work away if I chose to.

Thing is when I was doing work far to cheaply the only customers I ever seemed to get were those that didn’t care what they had as long as it was cheap because all the guys I was doing work for told their mates who were the same sort of folk.
When I pushed my prices up I started to lose work because these people had no loyalty and would just go up the road to the next guy who would do it cheaper. Didn’t happen overnight but I slowly started to build a new customer base of people who were prepared to pay a bit more for something that looked good because they had the sense to realise that they would earn more from it themselves. Thing is the people who moved in the same circles as them thought the same so the type of customer I was doing work for slowly changed.
They still look for a fair price obviously and I am sure some of them must have compared my prices with other companies because some people have said that they had been offered cheaper prices. I just tell them that it is their choice but before they go ahead just check what sort of design and quality of materials they are getting for the cheaper price.

[David Hammond]

That is what is happening with myself at the moment.

When I took the business over there was no pricing strategy. Prices were pulled out of thin air, without the experience/knowledge of what to charge. Thus the reputation of being the cheap sign man ensued, a client base that wanted everything doing yesterday for pennies, and an owner who seemed to bow to customers demands.

I rocked up just under 12months ago, and it’s amazing. I turnover slightly more than my cousin did, but do 1/2 the work, which leaves me time to look at the business, and find other ways to improve, and also gives me time to find the work I want.

Where i am located there are loads of sign shops.

1 – fast signs right around the corner
another 2 down the down, 2 in the local shopping area, 1 in the next town.

Another thing the my cousin never did was promotion, no leaflet drops, no cold calling, just sat there waiting for the work to come to him. So only those local people (who want everything doing for nothing) know about us.

Competition is fierce here, simply because you can take a 10-15 min walk and get 3-4 more prices.

I am now involved with a networking club which is out of my area, less competition and better customers. Property is cheaper there, and generally seems like a viable option to relocate in a couple of years.

[Martin Pearson]

David, the more heavily populated an area the more likely you are to have competition on your doorstep but at the same time there will be more work available. Fast signs are a franchise and they generally have higher overheads due to a number of factors.

You have to try and move away from selling on price alone, I didn’t say it was easy but if you just worry about what others are charging then you will end up back where you were when you took over the business.

Customers also need to be educated, to most it is all sticky back plastic so if your sticky back plastic is a lot more expensive than someone elses they will think you are more expensive as a business. I had examples of cheap vinyl over recesses which had pulled out and torn, most people have seen that and just thought that was what happened over time. Very few actually realised it was down to the sign company using the wrong vinyl in the first place.
I could go on, there are quite a few examples of other things like this but really it’s giving the customer the right information so if they do go to someone else for a quote they have a better idea what questions to ask. Takes more time I will admit but was worth it for me in the long run.

[David Hammond]

Cheers Martin.

I am very careful what I say about my customers as I do not want come across as a narrow minded racist.

As an example of the daily crap I take, I had a group of lads enter the shop the other day. They wanted a correx sign, with some text on it, single colour black vinyl.

I reached for my price guide and just quoted out of the book. (knowing damn well it was leading nowhere) I can’t remember the price for eases sake lets imaging it was £50

They were shocked, and asked for a price for the sign if it was 1/2 the size, cos obviously it would be half the price. I again reached for the price guide, and quoted them £40. 1/2 the size does not mean 1/2 the time type, cut, weed, apply the lettering.

A small argument ensued, with one of the lads educating me that ‘a sheet of correx is like £12’ my instant response was "go and buy that sheet of correx and I will cut the letters for you and you fucking stick it on yourself." :lol1:

needless to say I’ve not had the call back.

[Martin Pearson]

That’s precisely my point David, you don’t want these sort of customers as they are purely price driven, a sign half the size, even if it had been half the price would not have generated them anywhere near as much business I bet so they are not thinking about how to get the best out of their own business.

That unfortunately is human nature and seems to be the same with all people regardless of race, colour, nationality, sexual preference, religion……………… shall I go on :lol1: :lol1: :lol1:

Believe me Fifers are known for having short arms and deep pockets so I know what it can be like.

[David Hammond]

Hey guys as it turns out I’ve managed to charge a little more.

The company had asked someone to do a design for them… 6 weeks later he turned up with the attached image.

By which time I had already being asked to do it.

He liked the colours on the sample, and asked for along those lines.

We’ve ended up going down the digital print route, so earned a few more pennies 🙂

[Matthew Feast]

I Think Phil’s right £185.00 + VAT we would charge.
otherwise you will be a busy FOOL!