Tips on doing sidework

[Benilson09 10+ year member]

Do any of you guys do sidework? If so, what advice would you give and how do you guage prices??

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[supraman1379 10+ year member]

I think most people here do it for half of what the local hops would do it for.

But me, if its a friend, I do it for free.

 

[Pitchblack98 10+ year member]

I think most people here do it for half of what the local hops would do it for. But me, if its a friend, I do it for free.

Will you be my friend?

lol sorry had to try.

 

[Benilson09 10+ year member]

That's how I've been doing it, I have a few friends that own used car lots so I do all of there work for them on the cheap. If I can charge less than I usually do, but at the same time if they get 10 cars in from the auction, none have sound and they need to be ready by the next day I tell them upfront I can't just give that much time away. Do you have flat rates you charge, ex, speaker installs, rewiring speakers, installing a hu when the harness has been cut etc?? Any input will help, I started doing this not to long ago and I want to be fair to myself as well as customers.

 

[Fast1one 10+ year member]

I think most people here do it for half of what the local hops would do it for. But me, if its a friend, I do it for free.

I stopped doing free even for friends because everyone wants me to do it now lol..I started charging an energy drink...now Ive moved it up to 20 bucks depending on how much I have to install...IE a simple amp install...

 

[supraman1379 10+ year member]

I stopped doing free even for friends because everyone wants me to do it now lol..I started charging an energy drink...now Ive moved it up to 20 bucks depending on how much I have to install...IE a simple amp install...

Yea I know what ya mean. I might have to stop doing it for free for friends because they start taking advantage of it.

Like my one friend. I drove all the way out to his house. After I fixed his MTX amp. Drove it to him, helped him put it in, and wire his subs up, and tune the amp. Didnt even offer to pay me.

 

[PatFitz9 10+ year member]

my price always depends on who i am doing the work for. usually for friends i just charge them beer and pizza. if i can't drink during the install i charge more and if i don't have time, they have to work around my schedule. thats the advantage of sidework, you don't have to do it.

 

[supraman1379 10+ year member]

my price always depends on who i am doing the work for. usually for friends i just charge them beer and pizza. if i can't drink during the install i charge more and if i don't have time, they have to work around my schedule. thats the advantage of sidework, you don't have to do it.

//content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/word.gif.64b12e39f936af3b4fff38a1c0bd0244.gif

 

[Benilson09 10+ year member]

my price always depends on who i am doing the work for. usually for friends i just charge them beer and pizza. if i can't drink during the install i charge more and if i don't have time, they have to work around my schedule. thats the advantage of sidework, you don't have to do it.

That's very true, I don't have to do it, it's nice to be stressed about not having work. Some of the vehicles I get in are repo's where people stripped the hu, kits harness speakers you name it. People ghetto out these cars so bad and then it's 10 times worse when they remove everything out of them. I will post some pics b4 to much longer just so you can see how bad some of this stuff is. That is also giving me problems when deciding what to charge. On a simple hu, where they want a used unit, i can get it in w/ kit, harness, hu and labor for about 80$. But the next time around I have to do some serious repairing and it comes out to around 200$. At the end of the day though, I enjoy the work, I get a since of accomplishment out of it, when the vehicle looks like total @$$ and I getting looking and sounding clean 3 hours later.

 

[supraman1379 10+ year member]

For the people I do work for. If they dont have the equipment, I will go with them and show them the better stuff to get. Usually to the local audio shop. Or they can give me the money and let me pick out the shit. Then I charge by the hour.

 

[PepsiFiend69 10+ year member]

i hate working on other peoples cars.. i hate worrying about breaking something, where as if it were my car i can just cover it up or fix it

the worst though is when something goes wrong, you always get blamed //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/crap.gif.7f4dd41e3e9b23fbd170a1ee6f65cecc.gif

 

[JohnnyChuttz 10+ year member]

I charge people a case of beer. Most of these people(co-workers) don't have any tools, so we install at my house. We get drunk and I show them how to build boxes and wire everything up the right way. By the time they have a six pack in them, they are ready to tear their own car apart. Usually ends by me showing someone how much fun it is to overpower old mids w/ 500w or and old Thump 12 meeting a wall socket. Good Times.

 

[Bolognablake 10+ year member]

I have a bad habit of doing stuff for free. I guess I hope that they can scratch my back at some point in time.

 

[pwnt by pat 10+ year member]

For friends, free. At most lunch and/or dinner. For other people, depends what it is. $10-20 bucks and/or a "donation."

 

[PESteele 10+ year member]

i do it for free for my close friends but no im gunna charge like 100 buck to pick them out a system and install it cause noone in my school has a nice system but me and they have no idea where to start