Official Luthiers Forum!

I don't have a shop that charges for work and I haven't paid others for work so I appreciate estimations from you guys.

A friend wants to pay me for work I did on his resonator. He wanted it setup to play- not slide.

Replaced the nut using a blank.
Replaced the bridge saddle- had to radius and size to fit spider and string height desired.
Leveled, dressed and polished the frets.
Repaired cone- had to fix the bolt/nut/cone for adjusting spider/cone tension.
Set neck relief.

I estimated $125.00 included the 23 for nut and split saddle.

On the money in my book!

_________________
"Act your age, not your shoe size" - Prince

Thank you Chris. Lucky guess on my part.
I thought about "time" but I don't know if I'm slow or fast LOL so guessed by the tasks.

It'll be nice not questioning my charge to him...thanks again.
Michael

This is strictly a hobby for me - I'm retired, don't need the money (or the hassle of reporting it) but I do love doing repairs - particularly on guitars that maybe no one else would touch. A local shop sends their repairs on to me - they are capable of doing basic setups.

We charge my time thru the shop at $30/hour, they get 10. I give a reasonable estimate of what I think its going to take for time, always on the low side and I charge materials at my cost rounded up slightly.

So on your reso I would estimate

1 hour for the nut plus a $5 blank. (it usually takes me 2 hours to make a nut from scratch)

If you are talking about a drop in maple saddle with an ebony cap, I happen to have one from Paul Beard - lets say 1/2 to 1 hour to install, radius and setup plus $10 for the part

Depending on the conditions of the frets, I can level and dress them in an hour. Replacing obviously takes more.

Setting a spider is a bit tricky, if everything is good I'll level the feet, seat the cone (no glue) and adjust the tension screw (that's actually pretty critical). I'll also check and maybe shim the neck stick - thats how you set the action on a resonator. I'm a reso player so I've done this a few times - lets say an half hour to an hour.

so, 3-1/2 to 4 hours at $30 if thru the shop, thats $105 - 120 plus $15 for parts - you're right on the money. If I did it for less time I'd give back the money, if it took me longer the estimate is still $125.
If they brought it directly to me I'd charge $25/hour for the labor so you're still pretty close.

Way low but on the other hand if you are not a pro who does this everyday your scale might reflect this and be lower.
In our neck of the woods that amount of work, well done, by a provider who has overhead (insurance, location, staff, regular hours, insults on demand...) could be in the $300 neighborhood. Your geographic location can skew this too depending on the concentration of repair Luthiers in your area.

We are the second highest with our prices in our region and that's the goal too. My mentor used to say be number one or number two in what ever you do or do something else. Jack Welch by the way, I used to work for him....

Anyway if there is a friend component or you are wanting to help someone out that can skew prices too. Lastly and this is not directed at anyone if the work is substandard like what we see from some folks the price should be lower.... In other words someone who uses a fret rocker as what dictates how their fret dresses are done and spot levels chasing individual defects and not addressing the fret plane as a whole is going to have inferior results to someone who does fret work with a high degree of precision. In other words a PLEK job might cost more than some hack in their basement with a 4" file.

So lots of factors to consider but in my region you are likely less than 50% of what a professional shop would charge for what you did.

I just buttoned one up that I spent some time with. A refret, crack repair (simple below the bridge), new nut, full set-up, and removing the thin CA that ran down the neck heel when I was not looking and gluing in frets $620 and I gave the guy a break too. Our one competitor who does comparable work in our region would have charged about 10% more.

Lots of factors. A useful exercise is to compare yourself to other service pros, plumbers, auto mechanics, etc. The argument can easily be made that the training required to be a real Luthier can exceed some of these other professions or at least equal it. They can charge north of $100 an hour, why can't we? Our shop works around $85 an hour and again we are not the highest in our region.

Thank you Freeman. I didn't time the tasks...and really when I'm working in my shop it's much different than if I were "working".
I bump into walls and forget what I was doing while daydreaming and just hanging out. Maybe that just comes from being...I was going to say "old" but I think the word is "comfortable".

Thank you Hesh. I thought my price was one for a friend.
I've played with guitars since 1963 and can safely say that his guitar is in great playing condition now. No doubt it sounds better too.
I felt with the effort and results I was charging half or less than what it would cost him from a "pro" - one with overheads you mention.

Well I was comfortable (lol) fixing his guitar and thanks to you guys I'll be comfortable with the bill...that he insisted on.

Best regards,
Michael

I don't time myself when I do the work, that is strictly the estimate. I usually take much longer. Its very important to remember that unlike Hesh and many others here, I AM NOT a professional, I am not trying to make a living at this. Each repair project is a learning experience for me - I explain that to my "customers". I turn down a lot that I can't do but I'll also attempt a five hour repair on a 50 buck guitar and only charge for an hour.

You might want to go to Bryan Kimsey's website - he has a good list of what he charges for various repairs. Bryan is one of the better Martin mechanics, he has done work on two of mine, and I think his prices are fair and representative of the industry.

In addition to Freeman's excellent advice although many jobs have "price list" prices that's for quoting and if you quote it you stick to it. How long it takes for individuals to do certain tasks varies as much as the quality of their output does too. Regardless unless it's quoted as time and materials a fixed price is the industry norm for most things.

The kinds of things that on rare exception I will go time and materials for are things such as professionally cleaning an instrument. Depending on the condition of the instrument this can be an hour or five.... and this is why I go time and materials.

Time and materials can also be a punitive quotation engineered to send someone packing..... If someone comes into our shop complaining about one of our friends who we know does excellent work we don't want to work for them either.... Red flag city!

Remember too that part of being a "successful..." Luthier in the sense that you are not losing money OR hating what you once loved is to recognize that you don't have to be all things to all folks. If someone brings in a wall hanger that was never intended to be a "real" ,musical instrument even if you think that you can fix it recognize that if you touch it you own it and now have to fix it. We frequently see mandos that were built in the 20's, ornamental and not built to actually be played that someone picks up at a yard sale that they think they can throw a few bucks at and have a working mando. We turn these away. Mexican tourist guitars are the same deal. There is also Chinese junk that sells for less than we charge for a set-up.....

Had a woman call yesterday and after I told her that most of these guitars were for tourists and be advised I am likely to decline on the work because it's not a "real" musical instrument. She proceed to tell me that it's signed by the most famous maker in Mexican history. I replied that so too are 199,453 other Mexican guitars just like it....

Violin guys know how many $60 Stradivarius violins there are, thousands when strangely the actual person likely made far fewer than that. Go figure...

Anyway in and with respect to Bryan there is also the issue of what region you are in and the availability of local Luthiers. Even the economy locally can dictate what we can charge for folks to use their disposable income on.

We started with a price list from a successful Luthier organization (with permission) but heavily modified it for our market, use, and circumstances. We have also had conversations with competitors about price but not to fix price, that's not legal but to see what a different perspective might be on the same jobs. We found ourselves low at times and high at times....

Back to Freeman. My friend I'm impressed with you and I hope that you don't mind me saying so!

If you don't mind a suggestion if your work is as good as I suspect that it is consider charging pro prices. The reasons being if you provide that level of value you should be compensated for it AND for the rest of us who make our livings with Lutherie it's a bit of a disservice to undercut pricing norms for your region. In other words don't be a little bit pregnant (what a visual eh ) and support your industry and friends here and elsewhere, Luthiers I speak of, by not skewing the market with unrealistically low prices. Just a thought. Besides you will have more cash to lose on Lutherie....

When doing favors for friends outside of my day business or occupation, I prefer the barter system when possible. For a job of this scale, I probably would either request an afternoon of helping me hang and tape drywall in my back room, or if they weren't very handy I'd settle for a bottle of Glenlivet Archive and a nice peach pie.

_________________
Eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation.

Double post, oops.

Did a little setup the other day (a 1966 ES-335!!) and the owner asked what he owed me. I knew he was doing a gig at one of our local wineries that evening - I said "the 2011 Cab would be quite nice, thank you" Didn't even dawn on me to include the pie - like Hesh says I think I need to start charging profession prices.

Btw, just having that guitar in my music room to "make sure it was OK" was probably payment enough. Since this is the electric forum I'll show off - the old one is on the right, the one I just built is on the left.

Looks great Freeman.

Back when I played Gibsons (through all the groups I was in except the last when I switch to Strat) I had a LP, L5-S and a 347. The '66 above made me think about the 347...it had a coil-tap switch- I guess somebody added that or a splitter switch to that '66. I wish I'd kept the 68 Goldtop LP . It was my first "real" electric guitar. $450.00 w/case if I remember correctly. I still remember the smell when I opened the case...isn't that weird?








edited for clarity about the switch on the '66 as I don't think they had that originally.

I can completely relate and remember smells too and how I traded in my 335 to get my dad a new fangled thing called a tape recorder... He wanted one, he wrote novels and poetry and was full of himself.... I was a kid who wanted to make my dad happy regardless of how he was all about only himself. Live and learn, wish I still had the 335....

No so weird then...that's a good thing. Yeah...those that got away. But it's nice to have ones head hit that pillow feeling they did good. "Stuff" can always be replaced...as we know.