Need some help with flat lettering quote please

[Kevin Flowers]

Mo
give Paul @ Fabricut a call & use gold acrylic. I’m presuming these are not on stand off’s as the stroke is very thin especially at 120mm height. How was you planning on bonding them to the wooden face. Plus if you are £700 above the other quote something is drastically wrong. I would say that your quote should be around the £700 but have not worked it out fully.

Kev

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

no, they will be on stand offs Kev, this isn’t the actual font being used, i was quoted £515 +vat for the letters alone from ashby, id rather stick another grand in and buy my own desk top cnc lol … i will see if i can get better quotes for the letters, it does seem a bit mad

cheers for the input

Mo

[David Hammond]

Did you give e thorne a call Mo?

I’ve not done a cut lettering job yet, but got a few prices off them and were alot cheaper than others.

[Martin Pearson]

Mo, just my opinion but I do think there are better places than Ashby for this sort of thing. Loads of people doing flat cut acrylic letters so easy to get a better price if price is an issue. Accent was one I used to use. Don’t know if they are still on the go but worth checking.

Secondly as Kevin has said you need to be really careful with this sort of job as sometimes with smaller text or a font with a thin stroke the letters either won’t fit on locators or if they do they look terrible because the locators are far to visable.
Personally if I had been doing this job I would probably have had a chat with the customer and suggested that they have their name don’t in flat cuts or moulded letters and the rest done in vinyl.

[John Harding]

Id allow 2 men i day install plus your letters marked up 1.5 and if its busy high street allow somthing for unsocial hours or Sunday but like Kevin looking at it im guessing £700 ish plus and I would try accent signs for the letters

John 😀

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

quote Martin:

Mo, just my opinion but I do think there are better places than Ashby for this sort of thing. Loads of people doing flat cut acrylic letters so easy to get a better price if price is an issue. Accent was one I used to use. Don’t know if they are still on the go but worth checking.

Secondly as Kevin has said you need to be really careful with this sort of job as sometimes with smaller text or a font with a thin stroke the letters either won’t fit on locators or if they do they look terrible because the locators are far to visable.
Personally if I had been doing this job I would probably have had a chat with the customer and suggested that they have their name don’t in flat cuts or moulded letters and the rest done in vinyl.

Yes thanks but I think I did say that’s not the actual text font, and the customer already has raised flat cut lettering we are matching and adding to that,

I thought about half day for 2 people but best quote on lettering so far is more than a quote they have had for the whole job, not from a cheeapie company too, they are a well renowned sign co that have been around a while

[Robert Lambie]

sorry, havent worked out pricing as such here mo…

but, what you need to be careful on here is the same thing that those trying to price their digital printing for the first time come up against and get it wrong.
they look at trade suppliers as a bench mark, then try and compete. what they don’t realise is, they are not quoting on like-for-like. nor are they setup the same in order to compete.

you mention this company you are up against is much cheaper. have you seen their quote, or had a verbal from the customer?

you mention they are long established, so "may" have their own in-house router.

their guys will also have allot of experience in fitting this sort of thing. so will fit it much faster.

Our company is geared up to do this job in-house.
I am telling you this, not to blow my own trumpet, but to see things from your competitors side of the fence.
faced with that job…

I would "try" and do the job in a gold composite sheet if i was trying to do it as cheap as possible. a Gold dibond type board would be about £70 and cover all those letters. what i have left over, ide probably have a white rear so get the use out of that, rather than gold face. so even my waste canb easily be used up.

Gold acrylic is more expensive and ide never get back round to using up the left overs, due to its colour.
personally, ide prefer to do the Job in "5mm" acrylic, rather than 3mm.

router. time would be minimal. an hour to an hour and half.

locator’s glued on and template drawn out on plotter. 30 minutes…

fitting on site… for me and a lad, ide recon about an hour and a half due to all the locator’s, as theres a good few letters there with around 4 locator’s each letter. but a quick tape up of the template, screw straight into the wood fascia with female locator’s as you are fed them with a screw in place by your lad. its done quick and easy.

obviously you have travel time etc to take into account…

my only outlay is £70 for the sheet of dibond, armed with a router, experienced staff and a sheet of composite, ide have it knocked out in jig time…

on the other hand, you have days to wait for your letters being cut, large outlay for the letters. slower fitting time etc etc…
my point here is, by all means quote on the job once you get a competitive trade price for the letters. but do not focus "too much" on the price you are up against. knowing your up against another company is fine, you will go in keener, but do not go in rock bottom because you will not have compensated for some things. so you could well end up doing the job at a loss.

i mentioned 5mm instead of 3mm acrylic. 3mm tends to show up more imperfections on the way the letter is fitted into the locator. slight twists or force into the locators changes the shine on the face and makes the letter distort a bit. 3mm is also very easily broken when clipping the letters into the locator’s.

you also mentioned matching old letters that are there.
ide try sway them in replacing the lot by offering composite because the letters will never match colour/finish due to UV and weathering damage. even if you get the exact same product. easy way to push composite is saying it would snap or go brittle like acrylic does.

down side of using composite is you need a different type of adhesive to acrylic. but if bought from a trade supplier it should make a difference to you.

"some" trade suppliers allow you to purchase the sheet material yourself and have your supplier send it directly to them and they only charge you a routering service.

as has been said, fabricut… ask for paul or mike. mention you are a UKSG member and they should give you a competitive rate as they are always mentioning to me they would like to work with the group more.

[Kevin Flowers]

Mo
prices from SignTrade adin Sign link mag. Contact details http://www.signtrade.co.uk

50 x 120mm = £1.22e = £ 61.00
10 x 230mm = £3.20e = £ 32.00
3 x 180mm = £2.40e = £ 7.20

£100.20 + VAT

Templates & stand offs are normally 10 to 25% on top

Hope this helps Mo

Kev

[Robert Lambie]

nice one kev, their price download here
I had a look before because Fabricut had one too but seems to have been removed. 🙄

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

Ahhhh thats more like it Kev, thanks for that, that means there is some mileage in the job.

Rob, great advice thanks for that, I had considered about another company having CNC capabilities and the amount of time that someone with experience could take, but with that in mind I’m prepared to spend a little extra time on the job for less money to gain the experience.

The price was given to me for the other quote by the customer, but it’s genuine because he works in the fire service with me and gave me the quote before i started, we have been good mates for a while, however I still need to make a living so I never cut my nose right off.

Truth is i want the job for my portfolio and the experience. However now I know that i can get the letters at that price, I can go in quite cheaper than the other company and still get a days wage, after all it’s just the fitting that needs to be done by me.

Cos, when I have done that I get to block out 22 2000mm x 700mm windows with full colour prints!… wooohooo! now thats up my ally! (but i dont get to quote that till i have done the flat letters)

Thanks for all the input guys, you have all been most helpful

[Hugh Potter]

Mo need to go in too much cheaper Mo, if he’s a mate you’re probably likely to get the job with a close price anyways so don’t go mad and devalue yourself too much!

stand off letters are quick to install, get whoever makes the letters to attach the locators and supply a stand off, all you need do on site is tape the template to the facia, drill some holes, whizz the female locators in and pop the letters on. jobbed!

[Mo Gillis-Coates]

Thanks Hugh, I should get it a decent price, I’m pretty ok with doing stuff like that shouldnt take 2 long

[David Rowland]

i know u said it already that it is not that font, but if u were pricing that for flat let cutting then they would run the cnc very slowly and add some finishing time as the thin font can be very difficult to cut. A standard arial will take a fraction of the time.