super center bid

[dan 616]

I have the mowing contract now.The manager ask me to bid on the plowing ,he wants one person to do all outside maintenance.Ive been plowing only drive ways.I would be using two truck one with spreader and rent 4x4 backhoe with 14' snow pusher.They want it cleared by 8am and 100% ice free.the trigger is 2" Ive looked at this site and have goten lots of great information ive come up with a price but not sure if its high or low.here is the size the main parking lot is 4.5 acres with about 6 little islands.there is a three bay loading dock with a 1.25 arce lot. two more lots that dont have to be cleared right away.one is 1 acre and the other is 1/3 an acre.There is two entrances atotal of 1/2 a mile of 30 ft road .the stores front entrance has to be cleared to.The store sits in a field and gets alot of wind blowen snow in it.The average number of storms the last ten years is 11 the most being 18 the least being 4.This will be my only plow job this winter. What do you think would be a good price. Thanks for all the help.

[digger242j]

What do you think would be a good price. Thanks for all the help.

First, I have to compliment you on the fact that you certainly seem to have done your homework. The suggestion was made that you give some more details and you gave a lot more. Please understand that the following is just my humble opinion of why you probably won't get the kind of specific answer you'd like. It's at least a good explanation of why *I* can't give you a specific answer. (Trust me, you wouldn't want my advice on bidding your job anyway. It's an area that I'm working on improving.)

In a few years of hanging around in the online snowplowing community I've seen members going out of their way to offer all sorts of help. From answering the most elementary technical question to actually covering sombody else's accounts because they'd totalled their truck, there's a sort of brothehood that just seems to happen. It's really cool to see it going on.

The one thing I do not recall *ever* having seen online is somebody saying, "you should bid exactly X number of dollars for that job".

There are a couple of good reasons for that.

One is that only you are qualified to know how efficiently you and you staff can do the work. What might be a profitable price for a really sharp organization, and be a break even figure for an average outfit, might lose money for a gang of idiots who spend all night driving around in circles. I sure don't want to be the guy who gives you the advice that makes you work all winter for free.

Another, and admittedly bigger, reason is that price is the one area where we all seem to play our cards close to the vest. If I'm in a different market than you are the chances are that my price will be too high or too low in your market. There seems to be an awful wide range of prices from region to region. If I'm in your market I'm sure not going to tell you what to bid--maybe I'm looking at the same account, or maybe next year you'll be looking at one of mine. Everybody hates lowballers, but I think most of us respect honest competitors. Even so, it would be poor business practice to give any competitor that sort of advantage. You never know who might be reading this board.

To put it in another light--tell us what you're thinking of bidding and we'll all comment on whether we think it's a good price or not. While you're at it, what are you getting for the mowing?

See what I mean?

[Pelican]

Another point would be that pricing is extremely regional. Prices for the same work I do in my hometown would be doubled if I travelled one hour south. Go north and they tumble. You're going to have to investigate your area to see what the rates are, and compare them to your expenses. I wouldn't recommend anyone work at a loss.

[Mick]

I asked for more information on your other post and I agree with Digger, you came up with a lot. But I also agree with him and Pelican about pricing - it's very regional. Now that we've got an idea of the site and your background, what is your idea of how long it's going to take you. Are you the only one driving both those trucks or are you going to have a partner? If you're plowing with a partner, you can usually figure it'll take less than half the time than if you are by yourself. Do you have an idea of what is common for an hourly rate in your area?

There are plenty here who are more than willing to help "walk you through it", but don't expect a dollar amount. The best you'll get is someone saying that you're in the ballpark with your time estimate, given your equipment and experience.

[dan 616]

it would be me and two other guys the price I was thinking about $35,000 the mowing contract is $13,000

[Adams Plowing]

Well heres one way to look at it if your looking at getting $35,000 and you divide it by 18 which you say is the most storms you guys have had in recient years you get $1944.44 so if you can operate with expencies less than that per storm then you shouldnt lose money on the season not saying you wont by those figures you never know you could get hit with more snow ofcourse making money is important but not as important as not losing money. One of the biggest things you have to figure is what it will cost you to plow and salt a storm. Keeping in mind if they want there lot totally ice free even though you might not plow you may be salting so therefore say it only snows 11 times you may come in good on that side of the figure but say you salt 33 times the salt adds up too so you have to factor into your price enough $ to pay for the salt too with a possibly higher number of occurances that actual plowing events.