Guides
How to price wrap and tint shop jobs from the bay hour rate
Wrap and tint shop pricing and profit start from one number: your occupied bay hour. Name the five hour components, set difficulty D, then test on a real job.
What to take away
- A price is derived from the cost of an occupied bay hour, not chosen from a competitor's website.
- Estimates fail on hours, not film. The five hour components below are where they leak.
- Geometry and hardware, not surface area, decide how long a vehicle takes.
- Test the formula on one finished job before the number reaches a quote template.
- No rate appears here. Every figure is a variable you fill in.
Step 1: cost one occupied bay hour
Let F be fixed cost for a period:
Cost per bay hour
- Ffixed cost for the period
- Bsellable bay hours
- Wdirect labor cost per productive hour
- F / B + Wcost per bay hour
Let B be sellable bay hours in that period. Count only hours a bay is free with a competent installer standing in it. Subtract holidays, sick days, and training. Do not count cure time when the vehicle sits and nobody works.
Let W be direct labor cost per productive hour, payroll burden included. The Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics tables give occupation and area wage estimates, useful as a sanity check on what an installer costs near you, including your own time.
Cost per bay hour is F divided by B, plus W.
Step 2: set the rate you need
Let O be the contribution per hour you want toward profit and reinvestment. Work it out rather than guess: add up the profit and reinvestment the business needs over the period and divide by the same B. Your target rate R is F divided by B, plus W, plus O.
Target rate R
- Rtarget rate per bay hour
- F / Bfixed cost per sellable bay hour
- Wdirect labor cost per productive hour
- Ocontribution per hour toward profit and reinvestment
R is the number every quote is presented from. Whether the customer ever sees it is a separate decision, worked through in the pricing and profit guide.
R is a shop-specific number. Benchmark it against your own break-even, not against another shop's menu price, because that price carries another shop's rent and payroll inside it. The one external check worth making is on the wage half: the BLS tables give installer pay by occupation and area.
Step 3: break the job into five hour components
This is where prices go wrong. For any job:
Five hour components
- H1 preparationwash, decontamination, solvent wipe, hardware removal
- H2 application
- H3 post-heat on stretched areas
- H4 finishing, inspection, reassembly, cleanup
- H5 cure or hold time
Name them before you estimate them, because the estimate is the sum of five separate jobs:
- H1 — preparation.Wash and decontamination, disassembly of anything that blocks a panel, and the final wipe-down before film touches the surface.
- H2 — installation.The hours the installer is actually laying and squeegeeing film.
- H3 — finishing.Relief cuts, edge sealing, and post-heating of every stretched area so the film holds the shape it was given.
- H4 — reassembly and inspection.Handles, mirrors, lights, and trim back on, then the walkaround under shop light.
- H5 — cure time.The hours the vehicle still occupies the bay while the film settles, even though nobody is working on it.
Total occupied hours H is H1 plus H2 plus H3 plus H4 plus H5.
Shops leave out H3 and H5. H3 disappears from the estimate because it disappears from the floor. Stretched film in a recess tries to return to its old shape and lifts at the edge months later, so the skipped minute returns as a warranty visit.
H5 gets dropped because nobody is working, which ignores that the bay is still full.
Step 4: rate difficulty, do not measure area
Two vehicles of similar surface area can differ by a full shift. Score the features that create work, not the square footage.
Difficulty features
Feature
- Recessed door handles
- Film stretched in and post-heated
- Deep bumper channels
- Compound curvature, nowhere to relieve tension
- Rivets and corrugations
- Film worked into every profile by hand
- Hardware that must come off
- Removal, careful storage, refitting
- Panels needing more than one piece
- Seam planning, alignment, visible join
- Existing film underneath
- Removal is its own job with unpredictable hours
Why it adds hours
- Recessed door handles
- Adds application and post-heat time
- Deep bumper channels
- Largest addition to application time
- Rivets and corrugations
- Turns flat panel into slow detail work
- Hardware that must come off
- Adds preparation and finishing time
- Panels needing more than one piece
- Adds planning time and rework risk
- Existing film underneath
- Quote separately rather than absorbing
Estimate effect
- Recessed door handles
- Deep bumper channels
- Rivets and corrugations
- Hardware that must come off
- Panels needing more than one piece
- Existing film underneath
Let D start at one and rise for each feature present. Set the increments from your own finished jobs, not from a formula: find two completed vehicles that differ by one feature and let the difference in recorded hours set the step. The aim is not precision. It is that a hard vehicle and an easy one stop being priced the same.
Rate difficulty, not area
| Feature on the vehicle | Why it adds hours | What it does to the estimate |
|---|---|---|
| Recessed door handles | Film must be stretched in and post-heated or it lifts | Adds application and post-heat time at every door |
| Deep bumper channels | Compound curvature with nowhere to relieve tension | The largest single addition to application time |
| Rivets and corrugations | Film is worked into every profile by hand | Turns a large flat panel into slow detail work |
| Hardware that must come off | Removal, careful storage, refitting | Adds preparation and finishing time, plus risk |
| Panels needing more than one piece | Seam planning, alignment, a visible join to place | Adds planning time and raises rework risk |
| Existing film underneath | Removal is its own job with unpredictable hours | Quote it separately rather than absorbing it |
Adjusted hours are H multiplied by D.
Step 5: build the price
Let M be material at the width you actually buy, including the waste the vehicle's geometry forces. Measure real waste on a few jobs before you trust any coverage figure.
Price formula
- Pjob price
- Rtarget rate per bay hour
- Htotal occupied hours
- Ddifficulty factor
Let C be job-specific cost: disposal from removal work, subcontracted printing, attributable consumables.
Price P equals R multiplied by H multiplied by D, plus M, plus C.
Then set a minimum charge that covers a full bay hour at R plus the material for the smallest job you will take, so a small job does not eat a setup you cannot recover. For printed or custom work, take a deposit that covers the film order in full before the roll is bought for that vehicle.
Step 6: test the price on a finished job
Pull one completed job and rebuild P, M, and the true hours from records. Ask whether the formula would have produced a price you were glad to charge.
Test the price
Does the rebuilt price match what you charged?
formula is working
, below -> R or D is too low
If it lands below what you charged, R or D is too low. If it lands far above, you have been underestimating hours.
This only works if the records exist. IRS guidance on what records a business should keep describes a system that shows income and expenses clearly, with documents behind purchases and sales.
One job number should run through the quote, the film order, the timesheet, and the invoice. Which services survive that test is the subject of the most profitable services breakdown.
Tint jobs use the same rate, with a different set of hours
R does not change because the job changed. A tint job is priced with the same P = R × H × D + M + C. What changes is the work inside the bay hour.
The five components carry different weight on glass:
- H1 — glass prep.Every window cleaned inside and out, old film or adhesive removed, and door panels or trim pulled so the film can be tucked behind the seal.
- H2 — shrinking to the glass.Flat film will not lie on a curved backlight, so it is heated and shrunk to the shape of the glass before it is installed. The rear window is usually the longest part of the job.
- H3 — installation.Film set, squeegeed, and trimmed on each window.
- H4 — reassembly and inspection.Panels back on, windows cycled, edges checked in daylight.
- H5 — handoff.A short block, because the vehicle leaves the bay while the film cures. The customer is told what the haze and the water pockets will do over the following weeks.
Tint shops quote per window or per vehicle, but the cost is still the bay hours the job consumes. Count windows into H2 and H3 instead of pricing a vehicle as one lump.
Film type moves M, and the better films often move H2 as well. Dyed film is the entry level and fades first; carbon film holds its color longer; ceramic film rejects the most heat and costs the most of the three. A shop that quotes one tint price no matter which of the three goes on the glass is giving away both the material and the extra care the better film asks for.
Removing old tint is its own service with its own hours, not a line inside H1.
Check the law where you are before you quote a shade. States set a visible light transmission (VLT) limit for certain windows in their vehicle code, and some allow darker film only with a medical exemption the driver can show. Quoting a shade you cannot legally install is a redo you pay for.
Worked example: a two-door coupe in gloss colour change
Illustrative figures only, chosen to show the arithmetic. Substitute your own.
F is 9,000 a month. B is 620 sellable bay hours. W is 26 an hour. O is 14 an hour. R is 9,000 divided by 620, plus 26, plus 14, which is 54.52 an hour.
Hours: H1 2.0, H2 9.0, H3 1.5, H4 2.0, H5 4.0. H is 18.5.
D is 1.30, for recessed handles and a two-piece rear bumper. M is 780. C is 40.
P is 54.52 times 18.5 times 1.30, plus 780, plus 40, which is 2,131. So the quote lands near 2,150.
Now the check. If the last coupe of that shape actually took 24 hours and you charged 2,400, your H was wrong, not your R.
What the price is allowed to promise
Price is half the offer. The promise is the other half, and claims about durability, protection, and warranty must be truthful and substantiated. The FTC's advertising guidance for small businesses sets out what that requires.
Keep the film manufacturer's material warranty and your own workmanship warranty separate, with different conditions and durations. A customer who cannot tell them apart will assume the more generous one applies.
Where the estimate goes wrong
- Quoting from a photograph. Paint condition and hardware do not show in a picture.
- Assuming a repeat customer's second vehicle behaves like the first.
- Treating removal as an hour. It is its own service with its own block.
- Forgetting that a multi-day job displaces short work that would have run beside it.
- Using a wage in W you can no longer hire at. The hiring and training guide covers what you are competing for.
- Leaving out the cost of the space itself. What that space must earn is set out in the equipment and setup guide, and whether to add more of it belongs in the expansion and market guide.
Common questions
What should I charge for a full wrap?
Whatever R times H times D plus M comes to for that vehicle in your shop. The worked example above lands near 2,150 for a two-door coupe in a color change, and it was built entirely from that shop's own rent, wages, and assumed hours. No figure transfers between shops, because rent, wages, and film cost differ by region and the vehicle differs by design.
Does the same formula price a tint job?
Yes. R does not change because the job changed; the hours and the material do. Count glass prep, shrinking, and installation per window, and set M by whether the film is dyed, carbon, or ceramic. Check your state's VLT limit before you quote the shade.
Is it fair to charge more for a harder vehicle?
It is the only fair way. Pricing by area charges the customer with a simple car for the difficulty of somebody else's.
How do I quote when the customer will not bring the vehicle in?
Give a range with the assumptions written down, and state that it is subject to inspection. Then inspect before work starts. Photographs do not show clear coat condition or an earlier respray.
Should I match a lower quote from another shop?
Only if you know what is inside it. A cheaper quote often excludes jambs, recesses, or hardware removal, and matching the price while including that work means doing more for less.
