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Liesl Dexheimer
01-13-2012, 8:45 AM
I have a potential customer who wants a quote on laser cutting acrylic pieces. He would like 3/16" thick acrylic in opaque blue. I immediatley thought of Rowmark's ColorHues but it's 1/8" thick. I did also find 3/16" blue acrylic from a local sign supply company (I can't remember which is better for cutting, cell cast or extruded?). What I am cutting is a pattern for some sort of design (it looks like a box but in odd shapes). I'm not sure how to go about quoting this job as he would like prices for 5, 50, & 500 sheets. Should I charge by the square inch (if so how much per sq in)? Should I take the wholesale cost & double it & then give a price break for the larger qtys?

Ross Moshinsky
01-13-2012, 9:17 AM
First thing you need to do is discuss what the item is. If it's a box, then you might have to offset the lines to get it to fit properly.

I'd suggest you get them to commit to paying for one. Once you've done that, you'll truly understand how much yield you can get from a sheet and how time consuming it is. From there, you can price quantity.

We'd bill this out at materials + time. Intricate cutting work takes longer and should be charged accordingly.

Dan Hintz
01-13-2012, 9:29 AM
Also, be concerned they want a wide range of quantity quotes. No one is interested in just 5 if they truly need 500, and vice versa. Get a feel for how many they really need, and then quote in quantities surrounding that general value.

Mike Null
01-13-2012, 9:55 AM
Taking the cost and doubling it probably won't get you to a break-even point. Look at all your costs, ie. shipping, packing and unpacking, set up, waste, engraving time, etc., etc.

IF they are going to glue these together I would use cast acrylic. Try Delvies.

Richard Rumancik
01-13-2012, 12:58 PM
Also, be concerned they want a wide range of quantity quotes. No one is interested in just 5 if they truly need 500, and vice versa. Get a feel for how many they really need, and then quote in quantities surrounding that general value.

Maybe . . . but if I was developing a new product I would want to buy 5 prototypes to test, debug, demo for marketing puposes etc. Then I might need 50 for a pilot production run. I don't find the request unusual as I have done likewise many times myself.

Michael Kowalczyk
01-13-2012, 1:48 PM
if they are really asking for 5 prototypes then that should be mentioned if that's what they are because you can not base the other quantities on a product that has not been proven. You will most likely have to tweak or even redraw the final design. I say price according to your time and material and the other stuff that Mike Null said and just because you can do it while you watch the laser run does not mean you should not charge for it. If the job is large enough you may want to pay someone else to do it once you have it proven.

Prototype at retail and 50-500 at a graduated percentage of wholesale. I charge a one time setup fee and then a reduced reset up fee if nothing has changed for future orders.

Liesl Dexheimer
01-13-2012, 2:11 PM
I think I am going to lose my mind trying to do this price quote, ahh! I'm thinking of charging the customer $65 per sheet of cut acrylic, that means it will cost him $130.00 per box b/c it will take 2 sheets to create. Does that sound like too much? Right now this is based off or Rowmark's ColorHues @ 1/8" thick.

Martin Boekers
01-13-2012, 2:19 PM
What size sheet are you talking about?

Is there many curves in the art (it takes longer to vector)?
Hope you get fresh material or it will be time consuming to get the paper
backing off?

Like Mike said....Delvies, I do alot of letters cut out of acrylic and Delvies is great on sheet sizes!

Joe Hillmann
01-13-2012, 2:21 PM
Can you put a picture up of what they wan't? We have no way to tell if that price seems high or not because all we know for sure about this is that it is blue acrylic.

Liesl Dexheimer
01-13-2012, 2:45 PM
See below.

219575


Can you put a picture up of what they wan't? We have no way to tell if that price seems high or not because all we know for sure about this is that it is blue acrylic.

Michael Kowalczyk
01-13-2012, 2:47 PM
I think I am going to lose my mind trying to do this price quote, ahh! I'm thinking of charging the customer $65 per sheet of cut acrylic, that means it will cost him $130.00 per box b/c it will take 2 sheets to create. Does that sound like too much? Right now this is based off or Rowmark's ColorHues @ 1/8" thick.

Hey Liesl,
If you had a Trotec and you have a file that is laser ready, you could hit a button and find out with fairly good accuracy how long it would take to laser both sheets. Not sure if your laser has this option or not but I use it all the time and it works GREAT. And like Mike Null found out it is within seconds of the actual run time. Ballparking it to cover your self and knowing what it will take to laser the item can be the difference of getting the job or not.

If it fits in a 16.5'" x 28.2" area, send me a CDR file to 3mm@displayideas.com and I would be happy to show you how it works on mine.

Joe Hillmann
01-13-2012, 2:54 PM
is that biggest piece about 10 x 10?


See below.

219575

Liesl Dexheimer
01-13-2012, 3:01 PM
Actually I had thought of doing something similar (I have an Epilog). I could run the job without actually lasering it to see how long it takes.


Hey Liesl,
If you had a Trotec and you have a file that is laser ready, you could hit a button and find out with fairly good accuracy how long it would take to laser both sheets. Not sure if your laser has this option or not but I use it all the time and it works GREAT. And like Mike Null found out it is within seconds of the actual run time. Ballparking it to cover your self and knowing what it will take to laser the item can be the difference of getting the job or not.

If it fits in a 16.5'" x 28.2" area, send me a CDR file to 3mm@displayideas.com and I would be happy to show you how it works on mine.

Liesl Dexheimer
01-13-2012, 3:02 PM
Yes, the biggest piece is close to that (about 11" x 10").


is that biggest piece about 10 x 10?

Michael Kowalczyk
01-13-2012, 3:07 PM
Yes you could but then you are doing the job twice and one of them for free. It it takes the time to load the file and then a press of a button and it's done on a Trotec. Even if it was a 30 minute job it still takes only a few seconds to get an accurate run time.

Joe Hillmann
01-13-2012, 3:22 PM
Actually I had thought of doing something similar (I have an Epilog). I could run the job without actually lasering it to see how long it takes.


That is exactly what I would do using settings for acrylic, I would expect something like that to take about 12 -15 minutes with my 60 watt but would actually run it to find out.

Liesl Dexheimer
01-13-2012, 3:33 PM
Took 7 min 17 sec to pretend engrave the 2 large pieces (10 speed, 100 power, 5000 freq on my Epilog 35 watt)

Joe Hillmann
01-13-2012, 4:00 PM
Can you actually cut 1/8 thick at a speed of 10? I would guess with a 35 watt the speed would be closer to 1.5 - 2.