I am an estimator now....

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Amon

Member
Location
Denver, CO
How the heck can I find some taco bells or pizza huts to bid on? How do people find out about ground up opportunities for chains like that?
 

Strathead

Senior Member
Location
Ocala, Florida, USA
Occupation
Electrician/Estimator/Project Manager/Superintendent
How the heck can I find some taco bells or pizza huts to bid on? How do people find out about ground up opportunities for chains like that?

In my area we have a thing called the Builder's Exchange. They do many services such as filing notices to owner, but they also have a bid board. You have to belong to see the requests, but once you bid several, the contractors who do certain things, like Pizza Huts, Darden restaurants, mall buildouts, etc. will start sending you requests straight in. For future, you can also get the name of the Construction managers on project currently going and reach out to them to get on their future bid list.
 

sameguy

Senior Member
Location
New York
Occupation
Master Elec./JW retired
Contact corporate and ask how to bid in your area.
Never bid those, but did bid similar and they were very low profit margins and would call back asking for lower price due to finding, "an other who was lower but we would like to work with you!"
Look in your newspaper classifieds, call your local municipals and ask how.
Pay for bid sheets, Dodge report, etc..
 

romex jockey

Senior Member
Location
Vermont
Occupation
electrician
Emailed and called over 30 GCs today. .

30 ? omg....;)
the star wars bar scene comes to mind....

ZZ4051C5AB.jpg


~RJ~
 

ritelec

Senior Member
Location
Jersey
Emailed and called over 30 GCs today. Already got some prints emailed over. THanks everyone.

Sure.... they'll always shop numbers, keep their current contractors honest... and remember your only as good as you last bid.
Here today, gone later today... good luck, try not to spin your wheels too much with them...
 

Strathead

Senior Member
Location
Ocala, Florida, USA
Occupation
Electrician/Estimator/Project Manager/Superintendent
Bidding out of town GC's and Taco Bells is a race to the bottom

Taco Bells maybe, but out of town I don't agree with. Not is this environment. I have done quite well on out of town contractors. Some of them are having trouble getting multiple bids. I would rather bid a restaurant or a little strip mall shop than say, a local fire station that gets 6 local GC's each with their own two or three electricals. BTW, I used to feel the way you do, I have adjusted my thinking.
 

cdslotz

Senior Member
Taco Bells maybe, but out of town I don't agree with. Not is this environment. I have done quite well on out of town contractors. Some of them are having trouble getting multiple bids. I would rather bid a restaurant or a little strip mall shop than say, a local fire station that gets 6 local GC's each with their own two or three electricals. BTW, I used to feel the way you do, I have adjusted my thinking.

Most out of town GC's come into town to build a chain store/restaurant that they have built a hundred times. They know exactly how much the electrical should run. Your bid to them is the starting point to negotiation.
At that point, it's a buyout auction to see who will take it 20% lower than the known cost. Not to mention the fast track nature of these jobs means you have completed most of the job and spent all your material money before you receive your first check. Then when the job is done and tacos are being sold, you have to fight for you final payments and change orders and the GC is gone.....no thanks

As far as having 6 GC's with each having 2 or 3 of their EC's, I like those situations much better. I will only work with my GC and bid not the other 5. I have good honest relationships with my GC.
 

brantmacga

Señor Member
Location
Georgia
Occupation
Former Child
Bidding out of town GC's and Taco Bells is a race to the bottom

Have to disagree based on current market conditions.

90%+ of our business is restaurants, and Taco Bell is one of our brands. For quite some time now it hasn’t been about who the lowest bid is; it’s about who can reliably deliver a finished product in the shortest amount of time.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Strathead

Senior Member
Location
Ocala, Florida, USA
Occupation
Electrician/Estimator/Project Manager/Superintendent
Have to disagree based on current market conditions.

90%+ of our business is restaurants, and Taco Bell is one of our brands. For quite some time now it hasn’t been about who the lowest bid is; it’s about who can reliably deliver a finished product in the shortest amount of time.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thank you for being another one with similar experience. Perhaps it is partly because we are in lower wage areas of the Country. We can do a job for much less than California or Chicago, and so even at a good profit margin our rates still look good.
 
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