Hey guys! Located in East North Carolina and I'm just looking for some advice. To give you guys the whole picture, my whole electrical career was commercial new construction. When I got my Electrical Contractor license, I started my own company. My license is capped at $60,000 project value. I've been doing service work and it's been great but I have been doing all the work and all the office work and I just can't even fathom hiring a service electrician. I don't see how profitable it really is when taking into account a 20/hr rate and a company vehicle with fuel card. I've been getting into commercial remodels, we just finished a Dunkin Donuts. I can definitely see hiring someone for those types of jobs, but I got this one through word of mouth. My question is, what bidding software is best to find commercial remodels so that maybe I can start getting a crew together and start letting go of the field so I can focus on building the company? I want to grow my company and I just don't even know where to start.
USMCVetSparky
That is absolutely mind-blowing to hear. Beginning of this year I was a foreman making $19/hr, got promoted to superintendent at $27/hr, and then left to start my own thing. Well anyways, pay rates aside, I'm looking to get into commercial remodels but I keep hearing so many mixed things about bidding softwares. Do you have any experience with them?
I don't. I am a carpenter, but this advice still applies. I use historical data from past jobs plus my costs to be in business to set my pricing, as should you. But you have to know what your labor, overhead, material, and mark-up is in order to do that. Only you know what those numbers are because they are unique to your company. There is no bidding program that is going to price work that ensures you stay in business. There are a number of older threads on this forum that cover this subject very well. This will start you out:
Blue Book will get lots of plan sets in your email. Then just pick a takeoff software and get to work. Blue Book is not inexpensive but in my opinion it’s a no brainer if you want to grow on the commercial side.
There’s a learning curve. If you’re too cheap you’ll never hear back. If you’re too expensive you’ll never hear back. Once you get on a job, make the super your best friend and he may help you refine your pricing for the next one. Go out of your way to make the super’s life easy and he will think of your company when they need additional work done.
Good luck, semper fi.
There’s a learning curve. If you’re too cheap you’ll never hear back. If you’re too expensive you’ll never hear back. Once you get on a job, make the super your best friend and he may help you refine your pricing for the next one. Go out of your way to make the super’s life easy and he will think of your company when they need additional work done.
Good luck, semper fi.
I started looking into better ways to train and keep our office and field crew aligned, and someone told me to check out how to join shrm. It's more for HR-related stuff, but I found a bunch of good info about hiring practices, handling paperwork, and even structuring benefits. Helped me set clearer policies without having to wing everything.
While its great to track every nickle when calculating costs its really not the way to judge pricing... This should be somewhat by the competitors in your area,,, customers do not care about your expense sheet. The goal in the end is superior service (customers opin) or better product that allows pricing above the rest. An amateur simply picks a spot in the middle.
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