Mat Survey

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In this matting survey you will be asked to price the following in 3 different sizes.

8 x 10 w/ 1 - 4 x 6 opening
16 x 20 w/ 1 - 12 x 16 opening
24 x 36 w/ 1 - 18 x 30 opening


1. Crescent Rag Mat 1613
2. Bainbridge Alphamat 8525
3. Rising 4ply rag white r606
4. Crescent Brightcore BR14987
5. Bainbridge Paper Mat 65
6. Crescent Moorman Fabric 7568
7. Bainbridge Alphamat Black Sable Core 8319
8. Custom 4ply rag fabric wrapped, using 12.00 per yard fabric.
9. Question will be the charge for extra openings in mat
10. Price for oval opening.
11. Price to cut a v-groove in a 16 x 20 mat, v-groove size 14 x 18.

This is a large survey, 27 question total. Please allow enough time to complete correctly. Only USA framers please. Even in Canada you have other costs and factors like currency exchange etc. that make your figure different than ours.

Thanks for your understanding and time in this very important survey.

framer

[ 07-02-2003, 05:39 PM: Message edited by: framer ]

[Less]

Less voted.
oval x2
v-grove x2

[Framing Goddess]

Ver-r-r-r-r-r-ry inter-r-r-r-resting!
Thank you framer!

[B. Newman]

I actually feel pretty good after this survey. My prices are pretty much in line with the majority. (I started to say "average" but someone once told me that "average is the best of the worst, and the worst of the best" :rolleyes: so...)

The one's I'm a little low on, I'll tweak a bit, and the one's I'm a little high on, I'll, well, that's just too bad! tongue.gif

Thanks Framer!

Betty

[MerpsMom]

Just finished this. Hmmmm...I sure charge a lot for mats. smile.gif But there don't seem to be complaints so.....

(Same thing for glass. Hmmm again.)

[John Ranes II, CPF, GCF]

Originally posted by B. Newman:
I actually feel pretty good after this survey. My prices are pretty much in line with the majority........Betty,

In this economic environment, when statistics are showing that more frame shops are closing than new ones opening, are you sure that you want to be somewhere in the middle?

Sometimes, the complex business formulas can intimidate us and due to the complexity of our manufacturing business, i.e. "Custom Framing", we often have a hard time evaluating profitability formulas to our business. This is where little rules of thumb might be useful for many of us. One of those simple rules is that the majority of our customers visit our shop for reasons <u>other</u> than direct comparison of pricing!

Therefore, Merps Mom observation that her mat prices seem to be toward the high end and that nobody seems to mind is A GOOD THING.

My cross town buddy, Ron Eggers once commented years ago that, "I keep raising my prices until the customers stop running away." His humorous response holds some validity.

John

[GUMBY, GCF]

I had a banker once tell me if I was running at above 85% or above capacity it was an indication my prices were to low. So I raised my prices 20% and we did not lose any business but increased our bottom line :cool: .

I figured our capacity by the average # of frames we could do per person per week.

[ 07-31-2003, 02:11 PM: Message edited by: GUMBY ]

[B. Newman]

Originally posted by John Ranes II, CPF, GCF:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by B. Newman:
I actually feel pretty good after this survey. My prices are pretty much in line with the majority........Betty,

In this economic environment, when statistics are showing that more frame shops are closing than new ones opening, are you sure that you want to be somewhere in the middle?

</font>[/QUOTE]What I meant by that John, was that I expected to be "muchly" on the low side. After all, I am one of those "dreaded homebased framers who are only concerned with being cheaper!" :rolleyes:

Seriously, I've done those pricing studies where you determine your total costs. Where you know what it costs to open the doors, even if you don't do a lick of work. And then added in a "generous" profit to determine hourly shop costs. And it works well - now.

However, you are correct in that if I am in the middle area, and the time comes when I can do a storefront gallery setting, then I will need to be charging even more to keep the profit where I want it to be.

Yep, gotta start doing that "raising" now, so that "then" will be profitable as well.

Betty