Sorry but its a pricing question

[flatyre]

Basically I've recently gone self employed but am having trouble bringing in work. I have a few mates in the industry who seem to get loads of work even when they throw out crazy high quotes. I'm offering my services at a fraction of the cost to get the money in and get my name out there yet almost every lead falls through. Now i'm not offering to do the jobs at a price that would make the customer sceptical of my skills, or question my health and safety awareness. I just can't land the jobs. For example, a lady asked me for a price to top some conifers and face them in. I reckon its a good two days work as everything needs to be dragged across the rear garden, through a brick archway to be chipped on the drive. I quoted £500 which also covers hiring a chipper at £130 a day (chipper only needed one day) That's £185 a day for me before tax and she still said it was too expensive! I know prices vary greatly depending on where you operate, but whats a fair price at my stage in the game operating in a rural area? I'm in Northern Ireland so prices would not be far behind Scotland, Wales, Northern England.

[10 Bears]

Perhaps its the additional cost of hiring the chipper thats making the difference.

 

Not to say you dont need one of course, but if you are quoting against a chipper owner who may only put £50 on the price for the chipper, then you can see how you come out more expensive every time.

[aiden]

hi mate

is always hard starting out, maybe you need to take chipper hire cost out of your quote, as others who own chipper might be cheaper . I never added chipper cost onto my quotes when i was hiring , just used to group work where chipper was needed so got a better hire cost.

[stihlmadasever]

Could some of your mates in the industry loan you a chipper for a day to save costs of hire ? Maybe hire a skip,usually cheaper per day than a chipper.

Perhaps go along with a mate when hes quoting a job to see how he prices a job.

[Starscream]

Without seeing the job in question its a little difficult to say, but here goes.. You say you just started out. From your price structure, you're doing the job alone. So, perhaps, if it was me and a groundie who I might pay, say £90 a day and I've already got a chipper. I could prove it with me at £220, waste £60, groundie £90. That's £370 for the same job. Bang, I won the quote. Think about it, you'll top them out in a day, and drag the brash for a day. You get in another man for £90 to drag brash and you've reduced the quote by £100 already. Ok you don't get 2 days work from it, but perhaps it's not a 2 day job.

[flatyre]

hi mate

is always hard starting out, maybe you need to take chipper hire cost out of your quote, as others who own chipper might be cheaper . I never added chipper cost onto my quotes when i was hiring , just used to group work where chipper was needed so got a better hire cost.

 

Good advice but at the minute i'm not getting enough jobs to group together.

[Vespasian]

Heres what you do, you tell em that you don't exactly know how much its gonna cost because your new to the job..

But you'll do all you can to keep the cost down, two people will be workin the job, you an your mate..

 

forget a chipper conifers are easy to pile up an shift as it is..

 

Tell her its gonna be in the three hundred quid mark give or take fifty quid...

an tell her if she's not happy with the work at the end of the day she don't need to pay nothin, its gonna be free...

 

she'll like that!!!!...

 

Now next time you go to a job an do all that, 100% success rate...

[flatyre]

Could some of your mates in the industry loan you a chipper for a day to save costs of hire ? Maybe hire a skip,usually cheaper per day than a chipper.

Perhaps go along with a mate when hes quoting a job to see how he prices a job.

 

more good advice but my mates are like me only doing tree work as part of their business, i'm a landscaper who wants to do tree work, mates are more like gardeners who do tree work, most just hire chippers and I don't want to leech off those who have their own. I think on this job there would be too much material for a skip, but I will price various sized skips tomorrow as it is a good idea.

[stihlmadasever]

Heres what you do, you tell em that you don't exactly know how much its gonna cost because your new to the job..

But you'll do all you can to keep the cost down, two people will be workin the job, you an your mate..

 

forget a chipper conifers are easy to pile up an shift as it is..

 

Tell her its gonna be in the three hundred quid mark give or take fifty quid...

an tell her if she's not happy with the work at the end of the day she don't need to pay nothin, its gonna be free...

 

she'll like that!!!!...

 

Now next time you go to a job an do all that, 100% success rate...

 

Something tells me your gonna be doing a lot of freebies

[flatyre]

thanks Starscream and Vespasian, more sound advice, I might have been a bit greedy with my prices for this stage of the game. I based my prices on what my mates make, which is about £500 a day usually. I thought £150 to £200 a day was cheap considering the work, looks like i'll be re-thinking my pricing!