Where's the big jobs?

[Mike8560]

I've been doing alot of smal jobs $1000 and under.
The larger Four or five thousand dollar jobs have dried up I ha nt seen a 5k contract in months.
I could use some more money o wonder if it will return.

[JuneC]

Gotta wait for the snow birds to arrive.  After Christmas it'll happen. 

June

[Mojo]

June is right. I am just now starting to get calls and booked a complete RV job.

For some reason the snowbirds seem to be a bit late this year.

Typically, like June says, my jobs drag and trickle in. Then after the holidays I am booked
solid and working 6 and 7 days a week to catch up. I was booked solid for 2 months out last year
after the Holidays and I had to bust my hump to get caught up.

I am patiently waiting for the onslaught. :)

Chris

[stitcher_guy]

Just shows the differences in our geographic and economic areas. To me, a $1000 job is a bigger than average job (aka convertible top install, seat set redo). I've got a number of my "small" jobs sitting around. These are $100 or so in range, even less. But, I take them. Good break from the other work, and if I can shoot out 8 or 10 of them in a day, I'm making good money. That's Wal-Mart thinking, but it pays the bills.

[Mike8560]

I thought hot rod inferiors were big Monet 4-8k
and I thought you did more of them Russ?

Maybe the birds sknbave to all return first. Just getting soany small jobs.

[SHHR]

I actually got busy back in October and November on some boats belonging to snowbirds getting ready to travel with them to Florida right before Christmas. We had another warm early and mid-fall here so many stayed out on the water until the last minute. Don't worry we're good and cold now (let me rephrase that part about "good" ) and the midwest birds ought to be getting there anytime now or just after the new year.
Kyle

[Mike8560]

That's good news Kyle on the busy fall do you get ma y people who so rheir upholstery over the winter?
I never did get many when I was in new Hampshire.

[SHHR]

I get very few on boats, however late in the boating season I get calls for estimates and it always looks like it will be busy for winter. Then I always get the calls saying they'll go ahead and store the boat and call me in the spring. I try to tell everyone this is the time to do it, but as soon as the first cold weather sets in boating goes off of everyones mind and it's time to winterize and go in storage. The first warm spell in spring the phone starts ringing again. I express on all of my estimates that they are good for 60 days for that reason. I do have one guy now that has a little Baja 180 that I rebuilt the engine cowl and rear seat this spring and just called me to do the captains chairs and bow seating. He wants me to one piece a month and bill him monthly 'till is done so he don't have a big bill at the end. He's a very trustworthy local businessman so I trust him that he'll pay. The boats in his hanger at the local airport which is 4 miles from me. I'll probably go over and pull all the seats and do at once then just invoice him the average over the next 3 months.

I though about advertising that to try to get some winter work in. Taking in a deposit to schedule work then invoicing the balance over a 3-5 month period. In a perfect world that sounds great, but I don't want to have to end up tracking down clients when they miss a payment either on accident or on purpose.
Kyle

[baileyuph]

I thought hot rod inferiors were big Monet 4-8k
and I thought you did more of them Russ?

Probably the situation is a lot like your work Mike, not every requirement is a full blown show car.  We get driver seats by the number to actually repair back to original specs, commercial transportation seats for example.  Each isn't a thousand dollars but we get more of them.  Works as better for us because more people have a $100 bucks to spend or are willing to spend than people with $5K to $10K on a full blown interior. 

I will take the less labor intensive work for profits, I am better at figuring my cost on a $100 job than a $5K job. 

Doyle

[stitcher_guy]

Doyle's just a couple hours south of me, and he's dead on. I have four full hot rod interiors this winter and spring on the books to do. But those are staggered (i'm making myself NOT have more than one in here at a time. Too nuts). The fill-in and the actual money making is the smaller jobs. Last Thursday, I did three seat repairs and a full blown custom set of seat covers on a golf cart being entered into a contest. All together, made about a grand. That's a good couple days for me.

I can figure material and labor, shipping and tax down to the penny for the daily work, and that helps sell those jobs. I actually lose money on the full blown jobs, but there's still a big chunk of money coming in.

I was talking to a friend of mine that does body/paint and mechanical on auto restoration. He also does general auto repair. Right now he as a jambed 55 Chevy body on his rotisserie. Does gorgeous work. We view the full jobs the same way. You try to ball park it for the customer and stay in a range. But if you break down everything and charge for every minute on a job, there's no way a customer can wrap their mind around it. You have to decide in your head what you want out of the finished job, and shoot for that. The customer wants to know f you're doing a $5,000 job vs. ab $8,000 job. They don't care if a yard of matierla costs $32.78.

[Mike8560]

Inhearbwhat tour saying Russ it's hard to break it down for the customer.  It one thing to tell them an bridge enclosure I's
going to be 5k  but it's bard for them to ubderstard one side of widows is a thousand bucks.

I myself make more profitt  on t time an full jobs and end up with money for big items I need to buy or bill taxs ect

[baileyuph]

Mike, do you have to spend considerable travel time for small jobs?  If so, I can see why small jobs wouldn't be as good for you.  If the travel and fit time for a job is a big percent of the total time required to accomplish the job, I understand.   

Small jobs for us, most of the time, we take them in and get them out fairly quickly and do not have to spend much sales time and our materials are relatively low in overall cost.  Customers always feel better spending a $100, once five times, over spending $500 one at a time.  Or something like that.  LOL.

Doyle