How long should a curtain and blind quote take?

How long should a curtain and blind quote take?

Once you have the measurements, pricing one window should take a few minutes, and a whole house should be quoted before you leave the customer or on the same day. The measuring takes as long as it takes. The pricing is the part that should be quick. If pricing a job takes you an hour, or the quote goes out two or three days after the visit, the time is going on looking things up and checking sums, not on the customer. That is the part you can cut.

Where the time goes

Write down how long your last few quotes took, from the end of the visit to the moment the customer had the quote. The time usually sits in four places:

• Finding the price. Opening the right supplier grid, finding the width and drop band, and checking it is the current list.
• Curtain sums. Fullness, fabric widths, pattern repeat, cut drop, lining, then the making charge for each width.
• Extras. Tracks and poles by length, motors, fitting and minimum charges. These are the ones that get forgotten.
• Typing it up. Copying each line into a Word or PDF template, adding pictures and terms, then checking it all again before you press send.

None of this is time with the customer. It is usually your evening.

Why a slow quote costs you

While the quote is not there, the customer is still deciding. If they asked two or three shops, the first one to answer sets the price the others are compared with. A quote the customer reads while you are still in the room gets its questions answered there and then. A quote that arrives three days later gets read alone, and the questions turn into silence.

A slow quote also gets rushed. A quote written late at night is where a width gets rounded down or a pattern repeat gets left out, and the mistake is only found on the cutting table.

A worked example

Here is a three-room job with example times, to show where the minutes go. Use your own.

How to get a quote down to minutes

1. Keep every price in one place. One current list per supplier, not five versions on different computers.
2. Write your rules down once. Fullness for each heading, allowances, making per width, minimum charges and fitting. Everyone in the shop uses the same numbers.
3. Quote room by room at the visit. Put the measurements straight into the job, window by window, instead of on paper you copy out later.
4. Send it before you leave, or the same day. Make that the rule in your shop.

Quoting software made for curtains and blinds does the first three for you. In InterioApp your products, supplier grids and pricing rules are set up once. You quote a whole house in one job, in the showroom or at the home visit, and the branded PDF quote goes to the customer by email from the app. It costs £99 a user a month, with setup from £1,800, in which we load your products and prices and set up your quote template.

When a longer quote is fine

Some jobs do need more time: a bay window with a bent track, a fabric you need to check stock on, a motorised system where you want the supplier's advice. Send what you can price straight away, and say clearly which item you are confirming and when you will have it. A customer waits more happily for one item than for the whole job.

See how long yours would take

If you want to see one of your own jobs quoted, book a 30-minute demo and bring the measurements from a recent visit.

First published on the InterioApp blog.