Do you think it would make any sense to charge large commercial contractors to bid their projects?  Imagine if everyone did it rather than the typical FREE nonsense.  Would surely keep the contractors from getting competitive bids when they already no who they are going to use for the project.

I think it would only work if everyone did it. That's never going to happen though. It's part of competition.

If you figure out a way to make it work let me know. If you can do that then I'd also like to get paid to drive to an from work and I'd also like to get paid to surf FabNet.

"...I'd also like to get paid to surf FabNet"

You guys don't get paid?

It seems you just get a bunch of bids and spend lots of time on commercial quotes for nothing.

Andy,
If your not getting any of them, then you need to talk to your builders to find out where you are getting beat and see if you can tweak your numbers to make it work for you. One of the things that has really helped us is when we brought stone fabrication in house we became a one stop shop for most surfaces, and contractors like when they have to deal with only one sub.

We do get lots of commercial jobs, and we do talk with them. It just seems lately there is tons of contractors bidding on everything under the sun. They come to us to bid to add to there overall bid. They never get the contract so we don't either.

Just frustrating how much time is involved for nothing.

Although frustrating it is great when you get the job. One of the things that we do that might help you is when we are bidding a sizeable job to a contractor we try to find out who else is bidding, seek them out and ask if they would like us to give them our bid, we get quite a few takers and we've already done the bid so to change a name and address is simple and we've increased our chances by bidding with more then one contractor for the same job.

Posted By Andy Graves on 15 Dec 2010 11:20 AM
Do you think it would make any sense to charge large commercial contractors to bid their projects?  Imagine if everyone did it rather than the typical FREE nonsense.  Would surely keep the contractors from getting competitive bids when they already no who they are going to use for the project.

Andy:

I think you should charge for bids. The estimators would get a real charge out of that one. They would find that particularly amusing seeing how they can't charge for bids and there is certainly no guarantee they are getting any work.

I've made money on commercial work, but since I can do a take-off, count and know my costs, I also know when the guy who won is losing his a$$. This happend more than a few times.

Watch what you wish for, you may get it.

Joe

The problem here is that at the initial stage of the job, you are only providing the contractor or sub with something that allows him to get his numbers in. There are so many fabricators in my area that the job always goes out to rebid and someone simply drops your numbers a bit and gets the nod. "I need you to shave this down a little" is what they say, and if you're the schmuck who spent the initial time generating the job material prices and spent the time breaking it all out, you have already invested in the job. That puts you at a disadvantage.

We see many situations where a sub will simply tell the contractor "take your low bid, drop five percent and that's our price". They will always try to get them on spec changes, etc, without having to do the initial effort to quote.

It takes time and resources to quote accurately. If you don't have to do this, you can get it for less.

So it is as much about the relationship you may have with the GC as it is your price.

Posted By William Wolle on 18 Dec 2010 08:30 AM
So it is as much about the relationship you may have with the GC as it is your price.

Bill:

You make an excellent point. Some GC's can see the value of having a sub that they KNOW will deliver, especially if things get derailed, rather than "saving" 5%.

Joe

Bill,
Yeah, and we will always happily quote those guys. We will go over the plans and make suggestions about better yield, quicker fabrication, smarter design, and etc.

Posted By William Wolle on 18 Dec 2010 08:30 AM
So it is as much about the relationship you may have with the GC as it is your price.

You hit the nail on the head with that statement.

"Yeah, and we will always happily quote those guys. We will go over the plans and make suggestions about better yield, quicker fabrication, smarter design (see architect!!!), and etc."

And you will bid and bid and bid and bid and bid and bid...  ...because once you bid to one of them, the rest is just a word program changing the name to bid to everyone else...  ...and then you call the architect you ALSO have a relationship with and find out everyone that has been to the plan room and/or has gotten prints and/or registered a bid and you submit to all of them.

That's what I need and what is missing in my business right now. I have too few architects I have established contacts with. Good point.

Now how do I change that?

Bill, you make some good points about architects.

Tom,

"Now how do I change that?"

Every time you put together a bid, make sure you get the architect info from the prints and call on them. "Are their samples up to date?", get the receptionists and librarians info. Are there any projects you are working on that I might bid?" Also, contact the local architects in your area the same way. Keep at it. You might offer a lunch presentation to the largest firms or do in conjunction with a distributor(?) or not. I think you picked up the program at the ISSFA thing a few years ago, there is some info in there as well although it is getting dated. And remember, you are building a relationship, it takes time, you are not going to sell a job today from this call. You want to become the guy the architect calls when he/she has a question.

Also, talk to Jon, Sterling does an exceptional job at this.

Awesome info as usual, Bill.

Thank you.

Sure would beat the "yeah, you beat the lowest bidder by 1.5%, but for that amount of savings we're just going to go with the regular guy".  Meanwhile we're into the bid for 60 man hours.  http://www.akropolismarble.com