posted
The nerve of people!!! This afternoon I received a call from a guy that works for an excavation company I do lettering for. I live in a rural area. One of the townships advertised a tender for 22-4x7' signs to mark the various villages in their area. They have no design and the tender info. is very vague. I was going to bid on the job but decided I could lose my shirt because there are too many unknowns. This clown calls and wants to know how much reflective lettering costs and what HDU is. Here is a guy that is not even close to being in the sign business thinking he is going to bid on this job which he has no tools to produce. (I don't think he has work in the winter). About the only thing he is able to do is the installations. One part of this tender is carved signs in HDU. He even asked me if I knew anyone with a CNC to do the routing-I do but I said "no". He thinks that because he got the tender to plant trees for them a couple of years ago that he should bid on the signs. I can't believe his nerve. Not that I need the work, but he is taking away the livelihood of people who do this for a living. I can't wait to see what happens if he does get the job-should be very interesting what he comes up with for a design.
posted
Sounds like you could work "with" this character as a sub that could help him a little with the quote for what you could provide at your price. If he moves forward mindless of the "unknowns" you mention & happens to get the bid (since real sign companies aren't bidding because it's vague) You just might get some of the work without taking on the risk.
I don't think it is so much that he has "a lot of nerve" but more a case of how signmaking skills have been devalued.
There was a day when the skills we have were genuinely admired and garnered respect from other professionals. The slew of no talent bums and such that have been proliferating since the advance of computerization in the crafthas done nothing to change this perception. All you need is a computer and your magic software... No talent needed! Yeah, right...
I kind of feel that you missed an opportunity to promote yourself and put some money in both your pockets. Instead of blowing this guy off as a dink, which he may or might not be, you might have offered to go in on the job with him.
Since the guy you know that does CNC work is available to the trade only, , and one job like doesn't constitute "being in the trade", you could have offered to sell him a design and arrange for the routing or carving of the signs. He could handle all the finishing and installation work on his own.
You could have offered to sit down with him and prepared a bid that would have been beneficial to you both. You know he is going to bid on this job and will, most likely, produce gateway signs that will be an embarrassment to everyone. You could have gathered a bit of respect with the community through all of this, too.
I can only imagine the comments that are going to be made in town when this is all over. my wife, Dana, went through such a situation when she had her shop in northern Minnesota. It will, in some measure, come back to reflect on you and leave you with little more to do than shake your head.
While I can admire your guy's initiative to make some money doing this project, I still have to laugh because it seems as though he has no clue. It does make me feel good that you are so busy to turn away a potential 50K job. I bet a lot of wish we were that busy.
I can only imagine how what you were feeling when you took this call having walked that path myself. In my youth, I probably would have been a real snit to the guy. I just think that experience has taught me how to think differently.
Let us know happens....
Have a great one!
-------------------- Bruce Bowers
DrCAS Custom Lettering and Design Saint Cloud, Minnesota
"Things work out best for the people who make the best of the way things work out." - Art Linkletter Posts: 6464 | From: Saint Cloud, Minnesota | Registered: Jun 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
I see no reason not to bid on it. If the specs are vague I would contact whom ever to get more details. They may need some education in order to do the job properly and they may be happy to be enlightened.
As for workload, why not sub out the project to another company and make a nice percentage from overseeing the project.
Don't leave money on the table.
-------------------- Bob Stephens Skywatch Signs Zephyrhills, FL
posted
Maybe it's just me having worked in construction related fields the past 8 years, but isn't it possible that the sign dealio is a small part of a larger project that the excavator might already have his hands in, so he figures he can win that bid as well and farm out that work (possibly even to YOU) so he can reap in a profit on someone else's work, having no involvement other than installing the signs which he would obviously know how to do possibly better than any sign shop having the knowledge of what kinda soil he might find on the site?
It's common for contractors in construction to bid on many jobs even if they don't do the particular work. They can always farm the work out to an expert, and there are always chances for "change orders" so they can get more money in the event they underbid without realizing the costs of the services they planned to contract out.
You COULD have had some easy CNC work, and you COULD have even gotten your normal price for it too!
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Heather, I go with the guys on this one, never turn down an opportunity to bid, Just ask for half up front, or cash in advance if you are afraid of being left holding the bag. I do work for all the sign companies in my area, as I have an edge and they don't . Don't bother me none. LOL Bill
-------------------- Bill & Barbara Biggs Art's Sign Service, Inc. Clute, Texas, USA Home of The Great Texas Mosquito Festival Proud 10 year Supporter of the Letterheads Website www.artssigns.com "MrBill-" on the chat page MailTo:biggsbb@sbcglobal.net Posts: 1020 | From: Lake Jackson,Tx | Registered: Nov 1998
| IP: Logged |
posted
I agree with you guys. I bid on 4 carved welcome signs for a small town a few years back and after huffing and puffing about my high prices, they went with a "local artisan". The signs looked like the routed camp signs that you see around and they were installed across the street from professionally carved signs for the town next door. After about 6 months the paint had peeled and the lettering was for the most part unreadable. I recieved a call from the same official that had damned my proposal and I did the signs per my original proposal. Because of the way the whole thing was handled, I recieved a nice write up in 2 local papers and several additional jobs from the offical.
-------------------- Terry Baird Baird Signs 3484 West Lake Rd. Canandaigua, NY 14424 Posts: 790 | From: Canandaigua, New York | Registered: Dec 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Bidding on vaguely described work is not my preference, but not always a problem either.
I recently bid & won $12,000.00 worth of work from Maui County. The bid request said 1" text on 3" x 9" plaques per ADA specs. There were over 100 signs with the messages typed out in a list & some notation about sign sizes could or should be changed as required.
The specs were so vague, it probably scared away other bidders except one. They bid 14K so I got it. First thing I did was spend over a dozen hours on scale drawings & client consultation to determine what in the heck they really needed or wanted. 1" text of the copy they provided wouldn't fit very many signs out of the bunch so I basically rewrote what should have been in the request for bid in the first place. Since 5/8" meets ADA, & many plaques were room numbers only I was able to get approval on many smaller signs to cover cost of larger signs.
I approached the job as though they had come to me with a 12K budget & asked how I could get signs to say what they needed at this price. I have already recieved over $1000.00 for the consultation & drawings.
After I recieve the signs from Scott Signs I will mount them to the walls with construction adhesive & a little double face tape to hold them while the adhesive sets up. My costs will be about 35% of the bid, so not a bad profit in the end.
I also let them know I would be happy to be contracted for helping put together bid request packages in the future. So hopefully I will get some more consulting & sign planning work in the future. They had paid their interior designer (for some reason)to do the package I had bid on. Whatever they paid her, it was too much.
Another department of the County once paid me $900 to draw up a bid request package. They wanted me to do the work, but were required to put it out for bid, so writing the specs & providing drawings for a fee helped them get realistic bids from clear specs, but I had all the layouts already done (& paid for) so it should have helped me to be the low bid. Guess I was greedy but they offered to help me adjust my bid if I had enough wiggle room to be interested, which I did.
[ February 08, 2003, 03:08 PM: Message edited by: Doug Allan ]
posted
Hey guys, you took some interesting angles on that little issue, which I appreciate. I certainly won't turn the guy down if he wants to sub out some of the work to me (if he got the job). I usually do bid on everything that comes along, but this one was complicated because of having to pour cement and install signs all over the country side. I guess I just didn't need the headache.But you are right in that I could sub a lot of that out and make some money also. Nothing like having two sets of hands making money at the same time. Ah, well...til the next project. I guess some people like that guy have a way of getting under my skin on a Thursday afternoon.
Since you came to the bb for input, it certainly sounds as if you got some good feedback, which, of course, I am not surprised.
I've gone both ways with situations like this, but, as time went on, I realized that it would be good to ask my sign friends and mentors and probably go with that, along with my instincts. A couple years ago, I would have walked away from anything that aggravated me, but lately, I have been a little more daring to aggravate myself, just jumping in and bidding, just for the heck of it sometimes. A little different twist to go against our instincts isn't it, but, we do need to try new things, why not?
At least once in a while! Besides, with all the support of folks in letterville that have the equipment, it may be a slap in the face later if ya don't try. I would! After all, some of the most aggravating artists or sign people sometimes turn out to be the best of friends!
-------------------- Deb Fowler
"It's kind of fun to do the impossible - Walt Disney (1901-1966) Posts: 5373 | From: Loves Park, Illinois | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
, and one job like doesn't constitute "being in the trade", you could have offered to sell him a design and arrange for the routing or carving of the signs. He could handle all the finishing and installation work on his own. 
![[Cool]](cool.gif)
Printer-friendly view of this topic