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Liesl Dexheimer
08-28-2012, 9:02 AM
I've had two potential jobs (different customers) where I've had to do price quotes on large & fancy awards. One was a fancy thick acrylic award and the other was a trophy cup over 2 feet in height. Before I quoted the price I looked @ the suggested retail price from JDS. I was in shock, the acrylic award they suggested charging $500.00 and all you do is stick a plate on the award. I quoted $240.00 to the customer and yet they still went with a far less expensive award. Same thing happened with the trophy cup. JDS suggested $450.00 & I quoted $260.00 but haven't heard back from the customer. Is anyone else having this type of problem? I know JDS and other companies say that this is just their suggested price but how does anyone actually make a sale!? Maybe I just live in an extremely conservative & price conscious region but most of my customers don't have money in their budget for that type of pricing.

Martin Boekers
08-28-2012, 9:55 AM
Liesl, I tend to use the pricing as guidelines. Somethings I don't make money on the product, but the engraving. Id rather make $25 for 10 minutes work than
nothing because they can't afford the piece. Exceptions, if I am engraving the piece (no plate) an it's expensive I do charge a fair amount.


This is sort of like going to a restaraunt, the waiter gets a bigger tip the more the meal costs even though they would provide the same service on a lower
cost meal. ;)

Ross Moshinsky
08-28-2012, 11:36 AM
Pricing structure in the awards industry has been the 2-3x the net price + engraving. The reason is pretty simple. If you drop or break it, you're not supposed to go broke. You're dealing with fairly fragile items and you can ruin them fairly easily. Also many of the items involve some assembly and that is figured into the markup. It also accounts for any engraving mistakes you may make. Mistakes happen.

Things have changed in the last 5-10 years though. It's becoming less and less common to see people charge for engraving. People are just doing 2-3x markup and not charging for engraving at all.

On very expensive items where risk is low because you might just be adding a plate and they aren't easy to break (metal trophy cups for example), it's fairly common to see people reduce their markup.

I have no idea where you are from or what kind of people walk in your door/call you up, but I'd say you need to learn the market better so you can direct them. If someone wants crystal and has a $50 budget, I know what they can buy. If they don't want that, they need to spend more or look at something else. If someone wants to write a story on plaque, I'm not normally going to make a sale in a solid walnut plaque. 9 times out of 10, they get a laminate board with a sublimated plate.

Laminate boards are incredibly under-rated on here. Most trophy shops pushing out a lot of product use laminate boards most of the time. They look nice, they are the right price, and they are easy to stock. People have no idea the cost of a laminate board vs walnut so your profit margin is higher and your perceived quality remains similar (especially when you pick some of the nicer laminate boards).

Mark Sipes
08-28-2012, 12:34 PM
Liesl, shipping and tax on top of the suggested price. Yes not sure where you are located but in WA. the purse strings have been pulled tight over the last 4 years. I still sell $200 acrylics and cups but mostly to Corporate customers..... The clubs have champagne dreams with beer budgets..........

Liesl Dexheimer
08-28-2012, 3:03 PM
Interesting points & comments. It's not that I'm new to this (been doing it for almost 11 yrs now) & generally I try to direct customers to a specific item if I know their budget but it does amaze me how some companies can get top dollar (or at least the suggested price) & it seems that around here most budgets don't allow for this. I usually triple the price on most plaques & awards & add about $10-12 for s/h and offer free engraving but some do take advantage of that & try to write a book on a plaque or add multiple logos. I think most of the reason is the economy some places are booming others not so much.

Martin Boekers
08-28-2012, 3:49 PM
I wonder how many really get suggested pricing on larger items? It's one thing to rotary a piece of crystal but to make a small plate.....

Joe Pelonio
08-28-2012, 8:15 PM
this is one reason why I prefer to avoid trophies and awards, and concentrate on wholesale signs and manufacturing large quantities of parts. The risk of damaging an expensive material/item is low, lots of repeat business and the profit is a lot better. There are many competitors importing large quantities of awards direct from China at a fraction of the price JDS and others are charging, and it's hard to compete with the dealers that can afford to stock the kind of quantities they buy to get those prices. If I'm charging $5-7 for a name badge, I can make a profit, but for less it's not worth bothering, yet people can get them online for $1-$4 depending on quantity. Luckily some people still prefer to buy locally.

Mike Null
08-29-2012, 5:34 AM
It's true that there are not a lot of customers out there for the high end awards but they do exist. In my experience they are accustomed to using better awards and tend to stay with their long-time suppliers. New customers need to be cultivated and sold on the advantages of better quality goods. That takes some salesmanship and I am not reluctant to discuss whether a cheap award reflects on the taste of the buyer and the impression they will make on others. There is an old saying about the bitterness of poor quality remaining long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.

My customers are usually country clubs and universities where the awards are on continuous display. Frequently, they are trying to match the quality of something they've used in the past. Even the individual awards for the cc's are pricey.

Contrary to Ross' very valid point of view, I do not offer trophies or artificial wood plaques as it is a business that I choose not to solicit but I do some $200-500 trophies for the clients mentioned.

Ross Moshinsky
08-29-2012, 7:15 AM
It's true that there are not a lot of customers out there for the high end awards but they do exist. In my experience they are accustomed to using better awards and tend to stay with their long-time suppliers. New customers need to be cultivated and sold on the advantages of better quality goods. That takes some salesmanship and I am not reluctant to discuss whether a cheap award reflects on the taste of the buyer and the impression they will make on others. There is an old saying about the bitterness of poor quality remaining long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.

My customers are usually country clubs and universities where the awards are on continuous display. Frequently, they are trying to match the quality of something they've used in the past. Even the individual awards for the cc's are pricey.

Contrary to Ross' very valid point of view, I do not offer trophies or artificial wood plaques as it is a business that I choose not to solicit but I do some $200-500 trophies for the clients mentioned.

My point really is, know how much you can sell things for, and sell them for that. If someone walks into my store looking at crystal awards, I ask them how much they have in their budget. People have no idea how much stuff costs. They want an acrylic award for $40 and want to write a story on it. Our job is to advise them correctly so they don't waste too much time. We absolutely try our best to sell items that match the recipient and the establishment but in the end, it's up to the customer to pay for the quality. I'm not going to make anyone feel cheap for wanting to spend $50 vs $150.

We deal with a wide variety of customers and in NJ, the expectations and standards change every 5 miles. Unless the product is truly junk or looks horrible, we don't have rules that we won't touch this board or that product. It's all about perceived value and experience. Not everything needs to be solid walnut and have a designer plate. That's $20 in cost + shipping. Not everyone wants to spend $80-120. Stocking a box of 8x10 High Gloss Mahogany Veneer boards with a 5-10 sheets of black steel is what I'd suggest everyone in this industry does. Quick, easy, versatile, and very profitable.

Mike Null
08-31-2012, 3:35 PM
And sometimes I turn business down. Yesterday for example, one of my regular wholesale customers asked me to engrave a $1500 trophy. It was a tall pewter cup with large and elegant handles which sat on a mahogany base with 4 plates attached. The engraving was to have been on the cup and was the three word name of the club. I declined the business as my agreement with this customer is to replace goods where I have made a mistake. Thought the risk to be too great.

Tony Lenkic
08-31-2012, 4:00 PM
Mike,

That would be the job for "Stunt Engraver", just a thought.

Mike Null
09-01-2012, 4:39 AM
Tony

Good call. The jeweler (my customer) has a GTX but has pretty much stopped all but the simplest engraving.

Joe Pelonio
09-01-2012, 9:43 AM
And sometimes I turn business down. Yesterday for example, one of my regular wholesale customers asked me to engrave a $1500 trophy. It was a tall pewter cup with large and elegant handles which sat on a mahogany base with 4 plates attached. The engraving was to have been on the cup and was the three word name of the club. I declined the business as my agreement with this customer is to replace goods where I have made a mistake. Thought the risk to be too great.
Would that be covered by your business liability insurance? I had an employee damage the paint on a van while lettering it and paid only the $250 deductible for a $1,500 repair.

Mike Null
09-01-2012, 11:01 AM
Joe

I don't think so but I haven't checked.

Gary Hair
09-01-2012, 11:45 AM
Joe

I don't think so but I haven't checked.

I did check with my agent and no, mistakes are not covered by insurance. If, however, you damaged it accidentally then your insurance would cover it - subject to your deductible of course. Mine is $1,000 so it needs to be a pretty expensive piece to even think about a claim.

David Takes
09-04-2012, 10:09 AM
Send him my way Mike. 888-364-6299

I've been in business about 12 years, but about 10 years ago I started a fund that accumulates with each engraving of customer-supplied goods. There is a percentage of each one of these "risky" jobs that gets transferred monthly to a special self-insurance account. Over 12 years that account has grown to a sizable number that allows me to take on jobs like this with great comfort. It may be a mind game I'm playing with myself, but these funds have always been allocated for errors on customer-supplied goods, so I consider the funds spent and non-negotiable for other uses.

One more thing, I did feed this fund initially with $500, but since then have reimbursed my general business account for that amount.

I'm not going to let a self-insurance account like this get out of hand. There is still a limit on the value of an item I am willing to engrave, but so far I haven't had to turn away a job based on excessive value.

Mike Null
09-04-2012, 11:03 AM
Dave

I am returning the piece today and I will mention your name. The jeweler uses another guy in St. Louis but pays a hefty premium for his work which is usually the same as mine and the reason I have his business.

David Takes
09-04-2012, 11:17 AM
He'll likely find it difficult to find someone willing to take on that type of piece, hence the reason one can charge a hefty price for this type of risk. :) Do you mind telling me the approximate diameter of the cup section at its widest point, which is normally the top?