How much do I estimate for waste/scrap on large jobs?

[Natalya Murphy]

Are there any rules-of-thumb to follow when estimating waste on large jobs? I've seen articles in the framing magazines dealing with estimating moulding waste, but haven't seen much in regards to mat or glass mess-ups that go along with a volume order.

We're currently halfway through our second-ever large order, working with white 8-ply matboard and having lots of "fun" discovering impurities in it after it's been cut (see separate thread posted earlier today). When we bid the job we assumed a 10% "screw-up" factor for matboard, but I'm finding that this number was too optimistic.

For those of you that have taken on volume jobs in the past, what has your experience been with how much mat or glass gets tossed due to mis-cuts, imperfections, etc?

 

[wpfay]

If I were experiencing greater than 10% rejection in the mat board due to flaws, I would seriously consider looking for alternative product. I would also be keeping all flawed boards to exchange for good product.
Miscuts are a different horse. In real production work you should have very little in the way of miscuts, or all miscuts. If you are doing a job where the matting varies from piece to piece, then you aren't doing a true production job, just a bunch of custom work, and you can expect a certain degree of human error. Still, if you are experiencing that high a waste factor from mistakes, you might want to revisit your work flow organization.

The only waste factor I figure in when calculating a big job is on the moulding. Depending on the size of the lengths, and the size of the frames, there can be lots of waste, or very little. One job generated 60 22" lengths of waste on a 3" wide moulding...no way around it. On another I was using 95% efficiently on a 100 frame order.
I usually order the mats, mount, etc. in package quantity to get the best price. You may end up getting a few more than you need, but you'll save enough on the discount to make it worthwhile.

 

[RoboFramer]

I really don't worry about it - the time it would take to do the calculations would count for a large percentage of the order if I did!

Nielsen give me 25% discount on all moulding and matboard; another moulding supplier gives me 20%, another 15%. My glass supplier gives me 15% on speciality glass and the best possible price on normal stuff, plus another 2.5% for COD.

Sure I'll give good discounts for quantity - but those discounts are based on the suppliers' list price - so there is bags of scope.

Ideally, to maximise profit all frames would leave practically zero waste on all components, but that's never gonna happen. But what the hec, even if the discounts for volume you have given are actually greater than those you receive, you've made it up in labour and if the offcuts are of 'useful' size - then use them - photo frames, mats to fit into those photo frames - etc etc.

 

[Rob Markoff]

I am surprised that no one mentioned that it really depends on which vendor you purchase from and also what the moulding is from that vendor. Some vendors have better lines of moulding within their own line.

I ordered 40' from one vendor in particular and could not get 13.5 usable feet. I have also had moulding of varying widths from the same box of moulding. And this has happened from one of the better quality vendors as well as a "economical" vendor.

Another consideration is stick length compared to size of frame and whether you can use multiple sticks to build a frame (due to finish variations). We usually buy moulding by the box. Even if you do not need "box quantity" to finish a job, sometimes the box, or multiple box pricing will be less that the length pricing and will allow for sufficient waste. I would be very surprised if volume framers have a waste factor less than 15%.

Also, storage and handling of the finished pieces is also affected by the type of moulding selected. Some pieces might "self destruct" before they even reach the installation location.

You mentioned that you are using 8 ply. Do you really need rag or are you going for the "look" ? We have found that Crescent's SRM board works really well for the "look" especially for volume and production framing.

 

[CAframer]

Here's an actual example that I worked on today ...

Theoretically I needed 75' of a 2" black lacquer moulding to complete 6 pieces (4 large, 1 medium, 1 small).

It actually took ten 10' sticks due to a combination of factors (a) only being able to get two legs out of a 10' stick for the large pieces, (b) a couple of sticks were warped, (c) a couple of legs chipped.

In short, in this particular case, I needed 33% more than the POS estimate.