Need Advice on Laser Cut Pricing Strategy

[Moss Gallo1]

Gentlemen,

Can you please offer advice on how best to price this project? I have a potential long term customer that needs cutting for 35 sets of fabric pieces that could lead to medium and higher volume orders. I do not want to scare them off with too high of a price.

Other Issues:

• I'm still in the process of acquiring my laser and have to sub out the laser cutting to others.
• I've received quotes from my subs but they are at both ends of the spectrum ($35 per set and $60 per set).

I've been reading everything on the forums and online about pricing laser cutting and am still not sure on how to best to approach this for a quote I need to have out by Monday.

Project Description:

• Laser cut a neoprene coated fabric. There are four pieces and each piece has a lot of circles and squares that need to be cut into them.
• The fabric is 60 inches wide and comes in big heavy rolls.
• It takes time to layup everything and precut the fabric with scissors to fit into the laser.
• The fabric makes hydrogen chloride fumes, so there is the added cost of fume scrubbers/exhausts that come with all this.

Quantity: 35 of each piece
Pieces to cut:
#1 takes 20 minutes
#2 takes 20 minutes
#3 takes 7 minutes
#4 takes 7 minutes

Washing & Drying

• I have to wash and dry the pieces after they are cut because they stink something fierce and have scorch/soot marks.
• The washing would be done at a laundry mat or in my home machines. I would let the pieces air dry to be safe.
• For higher volume in the future I would outsource this to an industrial washer or buy a few used washing machines to do the work.

Shipping:

• I'm going to have to absorb some of the shipping costs (I'm raising my per minute and setup charge to cover).
• The customer will pay to have the materials shipped to me and back to them.
• I will have to pay the shipping to my subs (I can't take the chance of my subs or customer connecting and cutting me out of the business). Subs will then ship all the cut pieces back to me to have them washed & dried before everything goes back to my customer.
• I am working on getting them to sign an agreement that would keep them from ever doing business with my customers but they can always tell me no.

Subcontractor's Prices (I have worked with both Subs before and Sub 1 does the best work but is many states away from me, Sub #2 is in my city):

• Sub 1: $35 per set (no setup fee)
• Sub 2: $60 per set (no setup fee)

Pricing strategy:

• I was planning on pricing this as a set to the customer for the laser cutting, washing, and drying in addition to a setup fee.

Strategy #1:
Setup Charge: $100
Laser Cutting (per set): $65.00
Washing & Drying (per set): $15.00
Total: $3,300.00

Strategy #2:
Setup Charge: $100
Laser Cutting (per set): $40.00
Washing & Drying (per set): $15.00
Total: $2,300

Strategy #3:
Setup Charge: $ ?
Laser Cutting (per set): $ ?
Washing & Drying (per set): $ ?
Total: $ ?


Thank you for reading!

[Scott Shepherd]

Probably not the answer you want to hear, but if it were me, I'd locate someone with a Zund and have them cut it for you. A Zund will destroy that type of job and you'll have no cleaning to deal with. It's the right tool for the job.

I have a neoprene job like you mention that I get about every quarter. I know exactly what you're talking about. Lucky for me, the customer prefers to clean them themselves. They wash the pieces in dishwashing soap. I also put transfer tape on the surface to reduce smoke residue a great deal. They cut clean, but you still get the black soot from the edges that has to be cleaned off.

[Joe Pelonio]

I'd pass on that job. Do your subs know about the hydrogen chloride? That is the gas emitted from cutting PVC and while this one little job might not be a problem, in addition to toxicity to human and other creatures, it's corrosive. I once saw a laser that had been used to cut PVC board (like Sintra, Komatex). Just one job the owner thought, couldn't hurt. Totally destroyed the inside within a few hours, looked like someone had left it in saltwater. He couldn't afford to replace it and after that was my wholesale customer.

[Moss Gallo1]

Scott,

Thank you. I will be contacting Zund and MultiCam on Monday to arrange for them to test cut some samples. I hope they can point me to some people with their machines near me.

The geometries we have to cut out of the pieces are small and precise. The fabric is like zodiac boat material and abrasion resistant. I've tried cutting this material on the large gerber and lecra textile apparel fabric cutters with terrible results.

From watching videos of the zund and multicam cutting gasket materials and leather it may work great.

The biggest issues I had with the gerber and lecra cutters was that they ripped the material up, could not get precise cuts and caused fraying of the fabric. The laser burns the edges nice and clean so I don't have to worry about the nylon fabric in the center of the neoprene material fraying. I am just losing almost all the time we save laser cutting on the washing and drying.

I've also looked at modular rotary dies with heat cores to help seal the edges of the fabric but the price was too much with very limited modularity compared to lasers.

[Moss Gallo1]

Joe,

I have cut this material several times in the past on a few different lasers. We have not had the issues like you described with PVC. The corrosive gas must be very small, the main concerns are the terrible smell and potential health issues from the fumes. Having an excellent exhaust with a short distance with minimal bends to the outside of the building from the laser and a good fume scrubber help.

[Martin Boekers]

Welcome aboard! Sometimes over bidding is the best thing that could happen!

You may not notice anything right away from the acid that is produced, but if there is any indication you are doing PVC the manufacter
of the laser will void the warrenty. Fumes are an issue and air scrubbers may not "clean" everything so be careful....

I see your Air Force, Active or Retired? I manage the shop here at Scott AFB.

This is a great forum, if you haven't been here long make sure you read the archieve. Heck be come a contributing member (only $6 a year) Right now
you could enter for a chance to get a new version of PhotoGrav.