Good, better, best pricing for electricians

What the three options are for

A single price asks a yes or a no. Three prices ask which job. That is useful when the customer is comparing you with someone who left a cheaper, thinner scope, and you would rather show the thin scope yourself than discover it on the invoice.

Good is the job that meets the request and the code, nothing extra. Better is the job you would put in your own house if the budget was normal. Best is the job with the part, the control, or the coverage they asked about and you can actually deliver. If you cannot say that sentence for each column, you do not have three options yet.

What must change between columns

Change something the customer can see or that you will stand behind.

• The gear: builder-grade trim versus a named fixture they picked.
• The labor: six openings versus six openings plus a new switch leg and a dimmer.
• The edge: who patches drywall, who hauls the old gear, how long you warrant the workmanship.

Do not change the math and leave the scope identical. A higher markup with the same lines is not “best.” It is the same job at a higher price, and a careful customer will spot it because the lines are itemized.

A worked example, labelled as an example

Example only. These figures are round numbers so the shape is easy to see. They are not what recessed lights cost in your city, and they are not a suggestion. Replace every one of them with a line from your own pricebook before this leaves your phone.

The request: six recessed lights in a kitchen, attic access is a scuttle, no panel work, customer is undecided on dimming.

The gaps are the point of the example, not the dollars. Better costs more because there is a dimmer and another run of wire. Best costs more because the fixtures are a different product. Drywall stays out of all three, so nobody “upgrades” into a trade you do not do. If your town requires a permit for this, the permit is its own line on every column, or on none of them with a sentence that says so.

How the per-opening price should be built, before you ever make three columns, is how to price recessed lighting.

How to say it on the page

Give each option a name a homeowner can repeat at dinner. “Lights only,” “Lights and dimmer,” “Lights, dimmer, and your fixtures.” A paragraph under each name. Then the lines. Then one place to accept one option, not a signature that could mean all three.

Put the same exclusions under all of them. Concealed damage, painting, and a panel that turns out to be full are not an upgrade path. They are conditions. If you hide them under Best only, Good looks cheaper than it is.

Keep the price hold the same across the columns unless a special-order fixture has its own lead time. Say that lead time on Best. A customer who picks Best and expects Thursday is a customer you failed in the writing, not in the price.

When to stay with one price

• The code, the utility, or the existing gear leaves one legal method.
• You have not seen the job. Options on a guess multiply the guess.
• The customer asked for a number to compare with a written scope from someone else. Match their scope first. Offer the other two only after.

A single price is fine when there is only one sensible way to do the job. The document type still matters: if they cannot accept it, you sent an estimate. That distinction is electrical quote vs estimate vs bid.

How the conversation usually goes

Present Good first, in one sentence, as the job that does what they asked. Then Better, as the thing you would add if it were your kitchen and the budget was ordinary. Then Best, as the specific upgrade they already mentioned. Then stop talking. The pause is them deciding. Filling it with a discount is how three prices collapse back into one.

If they pick Good, do Good. Do not sigh, and do not “throw in” the dimmer because you wanted Better. The thrown-in dimmer trains the next customer to wait for the throw-in, and it means Better was never a real price. If they pick Best and the fixture is special-order, read the lead time again before you promise a day.

Write down which option they accepted. A verbal “we'll do the nice ones” is not an accept. The page they sign should name the option. If your tool can show three options and record which one they chose, use that. If you are still on paper, circle it and have them initial the circle. A text that says “let's do better” is easy to misremember when the invoice arrives.

After the job, notice which column you actually wanted to sell and which one they bought. If everyone buys Good, Better may be a weak difference, not a moral failing on their part. Make the difference visible: a dimmer they can touch, a trim they picked, a warranty sentence they can read. If nobody buys Best, it may not be something your customers want. Take it off until a customer asks for that exact thing.

What to do when they want a blend

They will. Good's fixture, Better's dimmer, Best's warranty sentence. Do not price that blend in your head while you are standing in the doorway. Say you will send the mix as its own option, then send it. The mix needs the same exclusions as the column it came from. If the warranty sentence only existed because Best included a fixture you supply, it does not survive a swap to their fixture. Read the sentence again before you paste it.

Two options are enough when you only have two real jobs. Three empty columns look like a template. A fourth column for every blend looks like you do not know what you sell. Cap it. If they keep editing, the job is not ready to be accepted, and you are back in estimate territory until the list stops moving. Freeze the page, tell them the price holds to the date you already wrote, and let them choose from what is written.

Build the columns from lines you already trust

Good, better, best falls apart when each column is typed from memory in the driveway. The lines should already exist: an opening, a dimmer, a fixture allowance, a trip. That list is the pricebook, and the way to make one you will actually use is how to build an electrical pricebook. QuotePace can hold the three options on the quote the customer sees. The judgment about what differs between them is still yours, which is the part that should not be automated.