With a vast amount of your time spent on quoting, and often causing bottlenecks in the rest of the business, most business owners recognise the need to improve efficiency in this area. After all, the more quotes you respond to, the more orders you are in a position to win!
How long does it take you to quote a typical joinery job? For example a 3 bed house with 11 items, made up of 8 windows and 3 doors?
Manually (2 hours ) | With Software (30 mins) = Time saving of 1.5 hours.
If quoting in a quarter of the time sounds attractive, why not see what else software can do?
Tom Renshaw, Groby Joinery
If you save 75% of your time when quoting, how much of a saving is this in practise?
On just one quote, if you save 1 hr 30mins per quote, this can equate to £50.25 savings on quoting alone. Conservatively working on 3 quotes per week this adds up to £150.75 per week. This is less than the weekly cost of purchasing the software in the first place!
The cost savings aren’t limited to just quoting either. With material ordering, and
workshop cutting lists produced automatically once the design is confirmed, you can save up to 5hrs 30mins on each overall job. Again this equates to a cost saving of £178.67 per job. Is software
sounding more attractive yet? Don’t make up your mind yet, there are still eight more reasons to go!
Lee Crookes, Crookes and Son Traditional Joinery
With all your documentation looking professional from the initial quote (headed paper, personalised text, layouts to suit different customers), your customers’ immediately see a company that knows what they are doing. With all paperwork from initial quote through to order confirmation, material ordering, cutting lists, delivery notes and invoicing having the same professional standards, you have credibility from day one, without the customer knowing how easy this is to produce with the right software.
Andrew Miller, Andrew Miller Architectural Joinery
Software not only allows you to design and quote but provides a clearly documented specification. Your customer can clearly see what you’ve quoted, with true scale images providing clarity and detailed descriptions including fittings and finishing ensuring they have all the right information to approve the work without delay. Itemised costs also help further and ensure the customer knows exactly what they are getting and paying!
Richard Porter, East Yorkshire Joinery Ltd
It goes without saying that greater professionalism and clarity give your customer confidence. Often it isn’t about just one thing. It is the overall impression that you give your customer that means they believe in you as a company.
Wullie Urquhart, David Urquhart Joiners
Reasons three to five are related. All together they equal one thing – More work. Greater customer confidence, and faster quotes mean you get back to the customer while the project is still hot. Customers are more likely to place an order if they receive a professional quote back in a prompt manner.
Simon Walker Smart, Plymouth Community Homes (PCH) Manufacturing
The additional detail customers receive from your quotation software, and the professional printouts which make it easy to print and request signed order confirmations means that not only are disputes reduced they are also easier to win if they do occur.
Stephen Rawlings, Rawlings Joinery
Paperwork that consistently displays the job with clarity means that your customer has little reason to delay payment. There is no confusion over the final price or specification and clear invoices that include the same diagrams and details as the quotes means that the customer can match up quote to invoice quickly and speed up payments.
Peter Fletcher, Fletcher Joinery
Benefit from fewer questions from bench joiners due to clearer instructions and automatically produced cuttings lists providing greater accuracy. You can expect improved standards (everyone working to the same tolerances) and visibility of what’s going through workshop.
Chris Sandercock
Ensuring you’ve ordered everything for an order can be a headache. Missed items or incorrect items can eat into profit margins. Software can provide accurate and detailed lists of all materials that are needed for each job.
Glass sheets can even include diagrams of margin bars so you can be sure that your supplier knows what you want, with the greater clarity improving relationships with your suppliers. Confidence in your software can also lead to ordering glass early, removing delays waiting for materials to arrive and ultimately lead to faster delivery and faster payments.
Paul Brumfield, Kings Cliffe Joinery
These are just ten reasons to purchase software, though there are more! With time and cost savings from quoting right through to material ordering and production. There aren’t many reasons left to delay. Certainly the cost savings directly equate to more than the initial purchase price, so conservatively you can expect a return on investment, within 12 months. With software paying for itself in the first 12 months, further cost savings can directly improve your profit margins, or provide capital for further investment in tooling or machines. The choice is yours. Can you afford not to purchase?
Ian Selby, Timbawood