[thelist] Paying for proposals?

[Jay Blanchard]

[snip]
I've scanned this whole thread, and I haven't seen this point brought up
yet.
[/snip]

Preparing bids is part of the "cost of doing business". It's all in how you
account for it. The "cost of doing business" can be factored many ways, but
one popular way (if you need a close to firm $ amount) is to take the number
of days you you actually work with income per year and average each
day/hour/whatever. For each bid you put out you include an amount in your
total that represents this number. Example;

You have 300 days per year that produce income at $200 per day ($60K / Year)
You have 25 days per year that you do bids, also valued at $200 per day, but
there is no income generated. ($5K / year)
You get 10 projects per year, which means that you spent an average of $500
per project to get the project.
You can factor an additional $500 into each bid as the cost of doing
business. Or you can write off the hours, depending on how you have it set
up.

Now, this ain't the most accurate way to things...but from the above example
you are making some pretty good change and getting 40 days off per year. :)

Jay