Pricing 420sq/ft of Vinyl Lettering

[Austin B]

Doing a pretty big vinyl job for me and hoping to get some input from some people with more experience on how to price.

Run down of the job:
- It is all letters and numbers in Arial font 4.5" tall.
- Total vinyl needed comes out to 420 sq/ft. (70 yards of 24" roles).
- Oracal 651 and Rtape
- Cost of materials $300
- No clue how many hours this will take.

Right now I have it priced by the sq/ft at $8 which would make this job $3,360 (420sq/ft x $8).

Please comment any input you have for this size of a job.

Thanks
Austin

 

[ddarlak]

Sq Ft means absolutely nothing here.

You have to use your best guess on how long it will take. Always guess high.

 

[Splash0321]

For stuff like this I always multiply my material cost by my custom coefficient then add in my very conservative estimated cost per hour or per day.

Your equipment will play a big role in completion time but in my shop I’d be ballparking around $3500 for that job.

 

[Texas_Signmaker]

Do a small portion of it and figure out your time. Times that by however many you need to make. Use your shop rate and figure out the price. Weeding 4.5" arial is cake if your cutting is dialed in and shop is warm. $3500 aint bad if it takes you all day.

 

[victor bogdanov]

4.5" font will be a breeze to weed. I sell vinyl lettering quotes on Amazon etc and a full 30" x 50yd roll cut/weeded/masked ends up being about $1200 in decals. Since it is custom work I'd probably be in the $1500 range but hard to say for sure without seeing design.

Couple hours cut time, $250 in weeding/masking labor, my material cost for this would be $200

 

[bcxprint420]

Doing a pretty big vinyl job for me and hoping to get some input from some people with more experience on how to price.

Run down of the job:
- It is all letters and numbers in Arial font 4.5" tall.
- Total vinyl needed comes out to 420 sq/ft. (70 yards of 24" roles).
- Oracal 651 and Rtape
- Cost of materials $300
- No clue how many hours this will take.

Right now I have it priced by the sq/ft at $8 which would make this job $3,360 (420sq/ft x $8).

Please comment any input you have for this size of a job.

Thanks
Austin

If it was me you woukd be doing ok at $6 a sq ft and if you want to get more jobs like this id say go with the lower cost but again thats me. Ive just been in business 35 years but what do i know at this point?

 

[RyanECS]

If it was me you woukd be doing ok at $6 a sq ft and if you want to get more jobs like this id say go with the lower cost but again thats me. Ive just been in business 35 years but what do i know at this point?

Agreed, $8 seems high

 

[FireSprint.com]

Gotta figure out how long it will take. Even if just a guess, document the process so you can get better at estimating time next time.

Then figure your shop rate and multiply it all out.

 

[Johnny Best]

Get the $3,360 for the job and after you finish come back and tell us how long it took you. We will run it through our massive computer system here at S101 headquarters, develop an algorithm and then we could be more accurate in our pricing.

 

[Notarealsignguy]

4.5" font will be a breeze to weed. I sell vinyl lettering quotes on Amazon etc and a full 30" x 50yd roll cut/weeded/masked ends up being about $1200 in decals. Since it is custom work I'd probably be in the $1500 range but hard to say for sure without seeing design.

Couple hours cut time, $250 in weeding/masking labor, my material cost for this would be $200

I know you know your business but that seems really cheap to me. You have to include transfer tape which costs about as much as the roll of vinyl, then packaging time, time to print shipping labels and the cost of packaging materials which aren't real cheap either. All that for $3.20/sqft doesn't leave much meat on the bone IMO.

 

[victor bogdanov]

I know you know your business but that seems really cheap to me. You have to include transfer tape which costs about as much as the roll of vinyl, then packaging time, time to print shipping labels and the cost of packaging materials which aren't real cheap either. All that for $3.20/sqft doesn't leave much meat on the bone IMO.

My cost in materials for this would be around $200. I pay $100 for 30" 651 and $90 for 30" roll of rtape.

Here is how I look at it, my shop is open either way, getting a job like this or not, we still all come into work. My labor cost etc is still the same with or without this job.

I would rather get the job at $1500 than risk not getting it at $3k.

At $1500 I'm - $200 materials and lets say - $300 shipping pakcaging etc.

That leaves $1000 leftover for "profit", again I'm open and paying labor either way with or without the job so I'd rather have my workers busy.

This is just how/why I would do it this way, I lean more towards volume and having enough volume to make lower price possible

 

[damonCA21]

I would guess around $6 per sq/foot. It all depends on your overheads really, Add in wear and tear on the machine etc.. It depends on the client as well. Are they a massive corporation who can easily afford that, or a small independent who probably can't.
I can see it taking maybe 1 or 2 days if you don't rush, so still a good margin.
Also how busy are you? If you are having a quiet week then price cheaper rather than sitting around doing nothing, but if you are mega busy, then charge your full rate

 

[Notarealsignguy]

My cost in materials for this would be around $200. I pay $100 for 30" 651 and $90 for 30" roll of rtape.

Here is how I look at it, my shop is open either way, getting a job like this or not, we still all come into work. My labor cost etc is still the same with or without this job.

I would rather get the job at $1500 than risk not getting it at $3k.

At $1500 I'm - $200 materials and lets say - $300 shipping pakcaging etc.

That leaves $1000 leftover for "profit", again I'm open and paying labor either way with or without the job so I'd rather have my workers busy.

This is just how/why I would do it this way, I lean more towards volume and having enough volume to make lower price possible

I get where you're coming from now. We take a similar approach with certain jobs for the same reason.

 

[Superior_Adam]

Oh bu

My cost in materials for this would be around $200. I pay $100 for 30" 651 and $90 for 30" roll of rtape.

Here is how I look at it, my shop is open either way, getting a job like this or not, we still all come into work. My labor cost etc is still the same with or without this job.

I would rather get the job at $1500 than risk not getting it at $3k.

At $1500 I'm - $200 materials and lets say - $300 shipping pakcaging etc.

That leaves $1000 leftover for "profit", again I'm open and paying labor either way with or without the job so I'd rather have my workers busy.

This is just how/why I would do it this way, I lean more towards volume and having enough volume to make lower price possible

but your forgetting about overhead like building cost, insurance cost, utilities etc. Your not getting anywhere close to $1,000 profit. You cant just think about the employee hourly wage and cost of materials in a job and the rest is profit.

 

[victor bogdanov]

Oh bu

but your forgetting about overhead like building cost, insurance cost, utilities etc. Your not getting anywhere close to $1,000 profit. You cant just think about the employee hourly wage and cost of materials in a job and the rest is profit.

Yes that's why I said "profit"

But all the overhead is there with or without the job. So id rather price to have a better chance of getting it

at the end of the day I'd still have $1k more in my pocket because I'm paying the overheard either way.



It's like a hotel giving last minute deals on rooms because they'd rather have the room occupied at a discount vs empty

 

[Notarealsignguy]

Yes that's why I said "profit"

But all the overhead is there with or without the job. So id rather price to have a better chance of getting it

at the end of the day I'd still have $1k more in my pocket because I'm paying the overheard either way.



It's like a hotel giving last minute deals on rooms because they'd rather have the room occupied at a discount vs empty

It's like fill in work to keep the shop at full capacity. You don't have to kill it, the other work has already covered your sunk costs. You can pay labor to work slower or do nothing or cover their slack cost with work. More billable hours per week will lower you O/H cost on a per hour, per head basis.

 

[Stacey K]

I would do it in 8'-ish lengths. 26.25 sections. If that cutter is dialed in, you can weed the main part in seconds. Could you post what you are cutting specifically? Like is it a sentence or individual words, numbers? That will make a big difference when you go back to cut apart.

How many picks do you need to make?
How much cutting are you doing after to cut this apart?

I would do an 8' section today using same kind of vinyl and time yourself then x26.25 Don't forget to cut apart also and work at a normal pace or a bit slower.

Also - you can pop the words into Signs.com and see what the price is, make sure you are higher LOL your price seems a bit high to me.

 

[ikarasu]

Yes that's why I said "profit"

But all the overhead is there with or without the job. So id rather price to have a better chance of getting it

at the end of the day I'd still have $1k more in my pocket because I'm paying the overheard either way.



It's like a hotel giving last minute deals on rooms because they'd rather have the room occupied at a discount vs empty

Im guessing you don't do next day turn around though. How busy is your shop?

We're at pretty much full capacity in my shop - we have 15 employees currently.... We do a 3-5 day turn around, that allows us to fill up our day so everyone is busy and we don't have people standing around doing nothing....with the 5 day turn around, we can queue enough stuff to not need to take lower paying jobs / have busy work for people.


I do get where you're coming from, and your business model of online is different and gives you more flexibility.

For us, we put every job in a queue that's usually 3 days, max 5 days out - so that job that pays a few hundred in Proffitt would be taking up a slot from a job thats paying 2-3x as much in Proffitt... We could squeeze it in and offer overtime I guess, but then you're losing even more Proffitt.


Now, for my own home / side business I'd take the job at that price in a heart beat. I don't run my shop at near / full capacity though. So I see it from both sides!

I can understand why most shops wouldn't touch it for $1500 though.

 

[victor bogdanov]

Im guessing you don't do next day turn around though. How busy is your shop?

The online stuff ships in 1-2 days but it is all repeat work so pretty easy. Mon - Wed running at pretty much 100% capacity because Saturday/Sunday are best sale days. Then Thurs - Fri we're caught up and can fit in the cheaper work

Something like this I would say 3-5 day for this price. Next day rush would be more depending on the day of the week

 

[Austin B]

I would do it in 8'-ish lengths. 26.25 sections. If that cutter is dialed in, you can weed the main part in seconds. Could you post what you are cutting specifically? Like is it a sentence or individual words, numbers? That will make a big difference when you go back to cut apart.

How many picks do you need to make?
How much cutting are you doing after to cut this apart?

I would do an 8' section today using same kind of vinyl and time yourself then x26.25 Don't forget to cut apart also and work at a normal pace or a bit slower.

Also - you can pop the words into Signs.com and see what the price is, make sure you are higher LOL your price seems a bit high to me.

This file is part of the total file. It will be the same format but with more combinations of letters-numbers.

I am using a 24" cutter so I'll be doing 4 lines at a time that are about 40" long. Will come out to about 400 4.5"x20" decals.

I do this in a spare room of my house so not a huge space or table to work with. It is also not my full time job and don't really have overhead since I work out of my house.

It seems that my original pricing does seem high. I have mainly been doing shirt printing so all the input helps for pricing this job.

Thanks