For UL 508A panel shops and custom builders
Quote without the spreadsheet.Keep the margin you quoted.
CostBook replaces your quoting spreadsheet. Drop in the BOM, and FAT, crating and wiring hours can't fall off. When a supplier raises prices, you see which sent quotes it hits.
Supplier raises prices. Every open quote is rechecked.
PS-3 now costs $3,240 more. Margin down from 22% to 17%. You see it before the PO.
No yes on a losing quote. Your customer can't accept until you re-price or OK it.
Why custom builds lose money
Quoted at 24%. Built at 14.5%. No single mistake to blame.
Quotes sit open for weeks. Copper doesn't wait. And what isn't on the drawing is easy to leave off. Most shops find out on the floor.
Tue, Sep 8
Quote goes out
Two conveyor control panels. $48,600 to the plant.
24.0%marginThu, Sep 24
Distributor notice
Breakers up 9%. Copper wire up 14%. The spreadsheet never hears.
24.0%margin, on paperMon, Oct 19
PO arrives
Same $48,600. Parts up $1,701. Two FAT days and the crate, never priced: $2,916.
14.5%margin, for real
How it slips through
- 1.
The BOM only lists what's on the drawing. Ferrules, duct, the UL label, FAT, the crate. On a busy week, one gets left off.
- 2.
Nobody trusts the price book. Three estimators, three spreadsheets, last quarter's breaker prices in one of them.
- 3.
Margin and markup get mixed up. A 30% markup is a 23% margin. The quote goes out under target.
What you get
More quotes out. More margin kept.
- 02.1
Drop in the BOM. Get it back priced.
From EPLAN, AutoCAD Electrical or Excel, priced from your own price book. Engineering revises it? You only check what changed.
Fig. 02.1 Importing a supplier's new prices - 02.2
Every quote complete, whoever writes it.
A forgotten FAT doesn't trim the margin. It takes all of it. Set what every quote must carry, and nothing goes out until it's priced or waived with a reason.
Fig. 02.2 A quote laid out in sections, each with its own margin - 02.3
Catch a price rise before the PO does.
Your distributor raises prices. You see which open quotes lost margin, and by how much, while there's still time to re-quote.
Fig. 02.3 Stale prices on an open quote
How it works
From your spreadsheet to a PO you can build to.
- 01
Start from what you have
Upload the spreadsheet you quote from today, mess and all. Or start from the sample panel-shop price book.
- 02
Build the quote
Drop in the BOM. Add wiring hours, engineering and FAT. Watch the profit, and what's missing, as you go.
- 03
Send it
One link or a PDF, drawings attached. Your customer picks options and accepts online. Your costs stay out of it.
- 04
Keep the margin
Prices move before the PO? You see which quotes are hit. Update or hold. Your call, in time.
The terms
- 04.1
Priced for the shop, not the seat. Up to 3 quote builders on Base. Viewers are always free. Pro takes the cap off.
- 04.2
Your price book stays yours. Export everything, any time. Stop paying and you can still sign in and download it all.
Why CostBook exists
Built for one shop that kept leaving things off the quote.
It started with a family business that builds IC test boards. Every quote was parts plus hours, section by section, in a spreadsheet. More than once, a material nobody priced turned a good job into a near loss. Nobody made a big mistake. Something just wasn't on the list.
I built CostBook so that couldn't happen to them again. Then I shaped it for every shop that quotes one-off builds the same way.
— The founder
Questions about your shop? Email me at cloyd.abad@costbook.app. I read every one.
Make the margin you quote. Starting with the next job.
Bring your spreadsheet or use the sample price book. Your first complete quote can go out today.
14 days free · Every feature · No credit card