How to price fitted wardrobes per linear metre

Take one typical wardrobe and add up what it really costs you: materials, everyone's days on it, and a share of the van, insurance and workshop. Put your margin on top, then divide by the width in metres. Do the sums twice, once for a straight run between square walls and once for an awkward one. The two answers are your low and high rate per metre, and that's your ballpark for the phone.

What goes into the rate?

Four things.

• Materials: board, doors, hinges or runners, fixings and delivery, priced from your supplier for the whole job.
• Labour: every person-day on the job, making and fitting, times what a day costs you. Two of you for a day is two days. Count your own days at what you pay yourself, not at nothing.
• Overhead: a year's running costs divided by the days you work in a year, times the days this job ties the firm up.
• Margin: the share of the price you keep once the job's paid for.

Add the first three and you have the cost of the job. Turn that into a price with your margin, divide by the width, and you have a rate per linear metre. Measure the width along the wall the wardrobe covers, floor to ceiling, and use the same measure every time so the rates stay comparable.

Why work it out twice?

Because no two walls are the same. A straight run in a new build is a different day from the same width in a Victorian terrace, where nothing's square and the scribing takes an extra morning. The wall doesn't pay for that morning. You do.

Price the straight job and the awkward job. The gap between the two rates is your allowance for what you can't see from the phone. Give a customer the range for their width and you've told them the truth before you've seen the room. Subject to survey, always, because the survey is where you find out which end it's at.

Isn't margin the same as mark-up?

No, and it's an easy slip. Add 25% on top of your costs and you keep 20% of the price, not 25%. If you want to keep a quarter, divide the cost by 0.75 instead of adding a quarter to it. The worksheet does it that way for you.

How do finishes, tall ceilings and extras fit in?

Keep the rate per metre for your plainest build and put everything else on top. A painted finish or a tall ceiling is an uplift on the rate, a percentage you work out the same way: what does it add to the job? Drawers, lighting and the like are a price each.

Here's how that plays out on GuidePrice's example rates, for a 2.4 m wide hinged wardrobe, fitted. These are example rates, not any firm's prices, and every one is a guide price, subject to survey.

• In MFC, up to a 2.4 m ceiling: £2,050 – £2,550
• The same in spray-painted MDF: £2,750 – £3,450
• MFC, with a ceiling between 2.4 m and 2.7 m: £2,300 – £2,850
• MFC, under a sloped ceiling: £2,550 – £3,200

A homeowner can try the same rates in the fitted wardrobe cost calculator.

What about small jobs?

Per metre falls apart at the short end. A 1.2 m wardrobe still needs the survey, the drive, the van loaded and a day's fitting. Halve the width and you don't halve the job.

So set a minimum job: the smallest price worth taking the van out for. On the example rates, a 1.2 m hinged wardrobe in MFC comes out at £1,100 – £1,350. That's more than half the 2.4 m price, because the minimum takes over below a certain width.

Does per metre work for every wardrobe?

Per metre suits a straight run of hinged doors. Corners, angled ceilings and walk-ins stretch it. Some firms price sliding wardrobes by the door instead, since a door panel costs what it costs whatever the width.

I'm not on the tools, so I'd like to know: which do you use for sliders, and why? Email hello@guideprice.uk and tell me.

How do you know the rate is right?

Run your last three jobs of this type back through it. Take each one's width, work out the range from your two rates, and check what you actually charged lands inside it. If it does every time, the rates are fit to give out over the phone. If one sits outside, find out why before you trust them.

None of this tells you what to charge. That's your call. It's how to do the sums, so the figure you give on the phone comes from the same place as your quote.

Where does GuidePrice come in?

It asks for the same numbers. A rate per metre for each type of furniture you make, an uplift for each finish and ceiling height, a price for each extra, your minimum job, and how far below and above to show the range. Your customer puts in their width and choices on your website and sees a range worked out from your rates. They never see the rate itself.