[fakie99]

i know this has been kicked around a bit, but i need to re-visit screening my customers.

how many of you have a "project minimum" that you will accept (dollar-wise) for a new project? many companies around me have a minumum job size they will accept; i haven't becuase, honestly, i've felt a bit awkward.

but i simply cannot make enough money on a job under 3K. and i would like to let my prospects know that to save us both some time.

for those of you that do it, how do you address the issue of minimum project size with that first phone call?

thanks,

jim

[familyguy]

We have a minimum on maintenance. We don't take accounts unless they are a minimum of 10k and always have a reliable business to refer them to if we cannot provide them with service. I can usually tell if the project is going to be too small after a few discussions and occasionally a meeting/site visit. I explain that we are not cost effective on smaller sites because we are not set up for a mow and go type service. We let go of a $4900 account this year (grandfathered in before we set the minimum) because we knew we weren't making the amount of money we wanted to. Still profitable, just not enough. My crew is really good with attention to detail so why waste time there when they can generate what they are worth elsewhere? I have never had outrage, some disappointment maybe but always appreciation for a good lead.

The exception is if renovations are going to take place in the immediate future. We will take really annoying maintenance around ongoing construction for future design/plant jobs. That is our only exception.

[Stonehenge]

For installs, you can be direct, or you can ask about the scope of the project, then shoot them a ballpark range of what that project might cost, then ask them if that sounds like the range they were thinking about spending.

[sleepy]

That 500 dollar job might just land you the 40 grand job at "moms" place.
Life is weird like that.
I have a service call minumum. 50 bucks.
If its my fault its free, their fault 50 bucks.

[Dragonfly]

We find out the scope of work and if it sounds small we tell people that our minimum project is $5K. It saves everyone lots of time. Time is $. It's all just part of qualifying leads. Don't feel bad.

[Inspired]

It knew that scheduling would be somewhat easier when I decided to implement a minimum project size when I was a contractor. What really surprised me was how dramatically it effected my income. Productivity and then of course cash flow literally shot up. Even our traditionally slow months were better.

Go for it.

As far as how to bring it up, I would always gather as much info on the phone as possible, if it sounded like it was a small job I would just tell them. I might say, "Well Ma'am, I'm not sure we are set up for a job like yours", or "It's not really what we do best and I'd really hate do disappoint you". Most of the time they appreciated it. Once in a while I would get someone with a big ego and an angry response, but I really didn't want an angry customer with a big ego anyway.

Good luck,
Bill