How do I price made to measure curtains in my shop?

How do I price made to measure curtains in my shop?

Price a pair of made to measure curtains from five parts: the fabric, the lining, the making, the track or pole, and the fitting. The fabric is the hard part. Take the width to cover, multiply it by the fullness, divide by the fabric width and round up to whole widths. Multiply the widths by the cut drop to get the metres. Then multiply by your price per metre, add the making per width, the lining, the track and the fitting. Below is one pair worked through with example figures. Use your own prices.

A worked example

A pair of lined pinch pleat curtains on a 240 cm track, finished drop 230 cm, in a fabric 137 cm wide with a 45 cm pattern repeat.

Now the price, with example selling prices:

The fullness, the allowances and the making charge vary between workrooms. Many use a fullness of 2 to 2.5 for pinch pleat. What matters is that every quote in your shop uses the same numbers.

Where shops lose money

• Rounding widths down. 3.8 widths is 4 widths. Half widths are possible, but only if your workroom actually makes them that way.
• Forgetting the pattern repeat. Every cut has to start at the same point in the pattern. Leave it out and the fabric runs short on the cutting table.
• Pricing lining like fabric. Lining has no repeat and often a different width, so work it out separately.
• Leaving out returns and overlap. Curtains made to the exact track width do not close in the middle or wrap the ends.

Write it down once

Put your fullness for each heading, your allowances and your making charges on one sheet that everyone in the shop uses, or into quoting software that does the sum. Then a Saturday assistant and you will price the same pair the same way.

See it priced for you

If you want every curtain quote in your shop priced this way without the arithmetic, book a 30-minute demo and bring one fabric and its price.

First published on the InterioApp blog.