ANOTHER Pricing Question

[Gary and Jessica Houghton]

Hello All!

We have read the many posts where folks are discussing formulas to determine the value of laser work. We have seen anywhere from $60 per hour to $100 per hour, and largely agree. We tend to base our laser time on $100 per hour. However, we simply want to know what some of you think the attached sign might be worth.

The customer supplied the wood (simple pine board from home Depot) and the graphic of the house in jpg format. We created the text and sized it all up (minimal amount of time spent on that). This sign will be placed in front of this builder's spec home (the one pictured) as advertisement.

The customer will take these pieces, trim them to size, wrap them with some sort of frame, clearcoat them, and place them on some sort of mounting system. Basically we just lasered the image into the wood supplied by the customer.

These pieces are done on both sides and took a combined total of almost 6 hours on the 35w Epilog Helix (I know...that's a LONG time. But, the laser would likely have been idle if not doing this job)!

We certainly know this is not worth $600. Any comments on what this might be worth to the customer?

Thanks,

Gary and Jesscia Houghton

[Joe Pelonio]

Pricing can be an interesting dilemma. They chose this method for the sign, and it took you 6 hours. If you cut it to half, $50/hour that's $300 which seems very fair yet may still seem a lot to them. You didn't give the size, was it 2'x3'? As much as possible I prefer to discuss the price ahead of time, but you probably didn't know how long it would take.

Even if the sole laser owner in the area, we are competing against other sign methods. For example, if he had gone to a digital imaging capable sign shop that sign could have been printed in full color from a digital file with UV overlaminate and mounted on an outdoor durable rigid material like PVC for about $200. If he knows that, he may give you a bad time on your price.

You may have to consider whether there's potential for a lot more business from them before dropping your price too much.

[Gary and Jessica Houghton]

This sign consists of two pieces. Both pieces are 12" X 24". The top is the picture of the house and the bottom is the words.

We had no idea how long this would take. The words ran at a very slow speed to engrave deep into the wood, giving it almost a sandblasted effect. The wood grain popped out when we did this (a super cool effect). The picture went faster, but took as long as the words because it is twice as big. We knew this would take a while, but had no idea it would be that long!

[Bill Cunningham]

Pine engraves fairly easy, and at 300 dpi I would charge $313.00 thats $25.00 setup, and 576 sq inches @ $0.50 per.. Sure he could get a nice coloured sign a bit cheaper, but then again, that sign would be 'cheaper' and not have the intrinsic value or life expectancy of nice engraved wooden planks.. However, if someone just wanted the bottom piece, it would be $1.00 a sq. inch for the reverse engraved part..