Selling lights as electrician

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For years we bought lights for the job and sold them for a profit but most customers are buying online now. All recessed cans are. IMO, electricians job to handle and certainly if you have lights that the homeowner picked out there is nothing wrong with marking them up. Usually we have a warranty on the fixture for a year if we sell it.
 
cdslotz said:
Light fixtures should be marked up if you furnished them or not
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You can hide that markup in a fixed price much easier than you can hide it in a straight time and materials billing method.

If doing it in T&M you maybe just hide it in labor charges, depending on how you do things. If customer actually knows/watches your actual time and knows the rate, it will bring up questions if something additional is added to it though. But I don't list hours or rate for labor on my invoices, when I did I got too many complaints on the rate (and I wasn't necessarily that high either). Since I started just billing it as "labor" and then put a lump sum amount hardly get any complaints.

Something just don't set right with some to see 5 hours at $100 = $500, yet if you just put "labor - $500" on an invoice for same job they think nothing of it.
 
cdslotz said:
Light fixtures should be marked up if you furnished them or not
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To add a little more to what I said before, the beauty of this is you maybe don't take as much markup as if you did furnish them, but at same time since you did not furnish them any warranty is limited to your installation methods and not to the fixture itself. That also means if called back because of a warranty issue, your time is still billable to remove/replace it where if you are the one warrantying it not so much.
 
electrofelon said:
That seems a bit sleazy to me honestly. Personally, if I don't have to spec/source/purchase/pickup/warranty them, I'm fine letting customer pay, in fact that is my preference.
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Markup covers stuff that you do not think about that costs you money like handling time, reading the instructions, hardware, storage, etc. Just because someone else is supplying the parts does not mean that at least some of the markup should not be included to cover stuff you have to supply, but would not get paid for without at least some markup.
 
electrofelon said:
That seems a bit sleazy to me honestly. Personally, if I don't have to spec/source/purchase/pickup/warranty them, I'm fine letting customer pay, in fact that is my preference.
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Me too. Though I one time had client provide some pretty much junk troffers he got at big box store and really wanted to charge him extra just to deal with them. I guess since it was a T&M job it likely did cost him a little more in labor charges regardless.
 
kwired said:
Me too. Though I one time had client provide some pretty much junk troffers he got at big box store and really wanted to charge him extra just to deal with them. I guess since it was a T&M job it likely did cost him a little more in labor charges regardless.
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I just did a project where the customer supplied some pressure transmitters for us to install in a box. The original plan was for us to supply them, but as a cost savings measure they supplied them.

They gave us a parts list of what they were supplying. Of the twelve, only 4 of the units that came in were the part number that they gave us. Four of them had to be panel mounted (instead of valve mounted) and tubed up with barbed fittings that I did not have on order because the parts I expected would have had NPT ports. All of the transmitters were supposed to come with exposed terminals to wire to. Some did, some had pigtails, some came with a conduit box, and one needed a connector they did not bother to supply. This is fairly typical of my experiences with customers supplying parts, which is why I do not like doing it that way.
 
petersonra said:
I just did a project where the customer supplied some pressure transmitters for us to install in a box. The original plan was for us to supply them, but as a cost savings measure they supplied them.

They gave us a parts list of what they were supplying. Of the twelve, only 4 of the units that came in were the part number that they gave us. Four of them had to be panel mounted (instead of valve mounted) and tubed up with barbed fittings that I did not have on order because the parts I expected would have had NPT ports. All of the transmitters were supposed to come with exposed terminals to wire to. Some did, some had pigtails, some came with a conduit box, and one needed a connector they did not bother to supply. This is fairly typical of my experiences with customers supplying parts, which is why I do not like doing it that way.
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I fully understand. I have little issues with customer supplying lighting fixtures such as pendants, sconces, chandeliers or others that the decorative nature is somewhat high priority. They are the ones that have to live with what they choose. I don't have to warranty them either, nor is it my fault if they don't like them.

More likely to want to supply troffers, recessed lights, or other specific lights that are more general for the type involved in nature or where some code requirement may effect what is or is not acceptable for the location.
 
Nothing wrong in starting a lighting showroom and sell and install them. Pursing same route. Thought I be open already but O well. Do you have any lighting manufacture in mind yet.
 
AC\DC said:
Nothing wrong in starting a lighting showroom and sell and install them. Pursing same route. Thought I be open already but O well. Do you have any lighting manufacture in mind yet.
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You probably need to be in a metro area for it to work out. Most your customers likely be high end home owners.

Had two of my electrical supply houses that had had lighting show rooms for years both closed the show rooms in recent years. Too many people buying from on line suppliers. Both those places had a specialist that mostly worked the lighting showroom and not much else. Now only lighting in stock is recessed, fluorescent/LED strips, troffers, wraps, etc. high/low bays, outdoor area lights etc. mostly all utilitarian style lights instead of designer style lights.
 
Trying to target very high end customers. Hand made, American made. Expensive, but will see . Figured carry what lowes, Amazon, and home depot does not carry.

To OP, don’t know how big your store front will be, you could supplement your store with, either your every day items you would use, and, or items you would not normally see at box stores, maybe something like legend adorne push outlets. Sleek, pretty, and big box stores don’t have them and Amazon is ov with priced.

plus if your using most of those items it’s just a inventory room for you.
 
Use existing catalogs or create your own. Make sure the profit will genuinely cover the time and effort.

Ask customers to look in magazines and online for pictures of, or the actual products they like or want.

Let customers who want to, do their own shopping. One less headache for you, and no return hassles.
 
electrofelon said:
, I'm fine letting customer pay, in fact that is my preference.
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It has another perk, if customer is buying, paying for materials separately, it doesn't get added into your the calculations on the liability and WC audits and thus your cost for them.
But the down side is you loose the ability to control product quality and compliance. Had customers who insist on getting their own product and then get mad when you have to inform them that it won't work.
 
ptonsparky said:
Back when cans first came with thermals a customer wanted me to work on cycling fixtures they supplied. Nope, not after the first diagnosis.
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Might been cheap cans, but they probably still had wrong lamps in them, that may be harder to convince them than that they are cheap cans.
 
Nothing wrong with selling lights if your market is good for it. You have to make a living any way you can. Sell lights and offer install as an extra. Sell good lights & a good selection of bulbs, like the various LED bulbs for conversions. Supply houses are still thin on these, they were even before COVID. You may get other EC’s to buy from you, then you get a small commission on their business. Win, win.
Sell good quality solar powered lights if you can find suppliers. I would have bought those for a sign project if I could, years ago. This was just before LED’s & not much was out there then.
 
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