How to make profit from building computers? And also, how does this sound?

[andcorptech]

No. profit is not profit. You trade your time for profit. If you're busy, do you wish to make 25% profit, or 5% profit? If you're not busy and wish to be, do you wish to solicit work that will make you 25% profit, or work that will make you 5% profit? Remember, you only have a given amount of "time."

Your statement above, by itself, is a guaranteed trip to the poorhouse.

Rick

I understand your statement it its essence, but you really need to look at it differently. Why does building your own systems have to make you less profit, it doesn't for me. have a 40-50% margin on all systems, and I still sell them ?

It doesn't take alot of time to build systems once you have a good methodology and good staff. Plus I factor the time it takes to build into my margins, so why does it have to be less profit ?

You are correct that Profit is not always "Profit" using your examples at least, but if you are a sensible businessman you will make sure your profit is "Profit" if you understand what I mean. I know the comment was directed at the OP and not me, but I make my own systems and I am for from being in the "poorhouse"

 

[red12049]

I understand your statement it its essence, but you really need to look at it differently. Why does building your own systems have to make you less profit, it doesn't for me. have a 40-50% margin on all systems, and I still sell them ?

It doesn't take alot of time to build systems once you have a good methodology and good staff. Plus I factor the time it takes to build into my margins, so why does it have to be less profit ?

You are correct that Profit is not always "Profit" using your examples at least, but if you are a sensible businessman you will make sure your profit is "Profit" if you understand what I mean. I know the comment was directed at the OP and not me, but I make my own systems and I am for from being in the "poorhouse"

I build my own desktops. The only OEM desktops I sell are refurbs. Most of those new desktops are sold to residential customers, or to VERY small businesses, average 1 to 5 employees. I average 25-30% profit on those and am on the hook for a 2 year warranty. I also sell Lenovo Laptops. I make approximately the same profit margin, and it takes me 5 minutes to order one. Guess which I prefer, and which makes me the most per unit of time? Not that much warranty work is needed on either my desktops or Lenovo laptops, Lenovo also handles the warranty, although I am the customer facing entity.

Part has to do with location. I live in a small community in the southeast U.S. Very, very few businesses of more than five people. The average business of 1-4 people treats their computer as a consumer commodity, on average. FWIW, I am a in a retail location.

Rick

 

[Tekko]

For me its all about warranty, I know what dell charges for a 3 year warranty. So All I need to do is spec a machine with parts that all carry a 2-3 year warranty, mark it up 20%, sell the warranty for another 20%.

 

[hightechrex]

No. profit is not profit. You trade your time for profit. If you're busy, do you wish to make 25% profit, or 5% profit? If you're not busy and wish to be, do you wish to solicit work that will make you 25% profit, or work that will make you 5% profit? Remember, you only have a given amount of "time."

Your statement above, by itself, is a guaranteed trip to the poorhouse.

Rick

All is this is assuming I have no one helping me, have zero multi-tasking ability, and that building machines is time consuming; althought it isn't.

 

[red12049]

All is this is assuming I have no one helping me, have zero multi-tasking ability, and that building machines is time consuming; althought it isn't.

Not really. I usually have between two and three employees. The same rules of thumb apply to their time (since I pay for it) as apply to mine. As I said above, I build ALL the new desktops we sell. Even built a few laptops over the years, using a program Intel had a bit ago.

It's somewhat dependent on location, but I could use less than my ten fingers to count the number of high end gaming machines we've built in the last few years. And we've tried to push them.

We build those desktops because we're asked to, because our customers know and trust us (we've been in two retail locations in the same town for almost seventeen years), and know that we'll stand behind them, and we're local. All that trust and loyalty didn't happen overnight, it took a good deal of time.

Based on what you've said here, before you start your business and spend a lot of money you probably don't have, you might wish to stand back, and take a bigger look, and perhaps get some education in, basic business concepts and practices. It may well make the difference between staying in business or not.

Rick

 

[tankman1989]

I would focus on high dollar machines as building lower price ones are not worth the headache unless you get some kind of service or warranty contract with them. The LAST thing you want is selling a $300 desktop, making $20-40 on it and spending 5-8 hours in support down the road (similar happened to me and IT IS NOT FUN!!)

 

[Bigtek1]

To Build or not to build

Long time reader and first post.
IMHO
Having spent many years with the big box companies I can tell you they obcess about us small guys and how much of the market white boxes have of the market share. Old studies showed 65% of the market was controlled by small builders. I say Old because I left fortune 100 world 4 yrs ago.
They were always working on how can we gain more market share. How do we overcome the local repair shop.
I have worked in 5 small shops in my years of work. One thing I learned was customers will come in and ask how much your computer cost. I give them my price. Then you hear well I can buy one at (insert store or company name here for xyz price).
I then say well sound like you found a deal hope it works out for you. Say hello to india for me when it breaks down.
Now the way I deal with this is I restate my price and add in you get local support, local repair and I pay local taxes and hire local help. That system was made over seas you get your help from over seas and hope you can understand them. And when it breaks down and you need help your warranty does not pay my bill.
My builds get bench priority, my warrantys are covered in my shop by the builder. And I speak decent english lol
Techs tend to play a price war, never get drawn into that, there is no winner, no profit is not winning. Build a solid machine you are proud of and would own, then price it with a reasonable profit I shoot for 150 to 250 and I up sale as much as possible. I have a system on display, that way they can see what I offer.
I just sold 5 i3 system with windows 7 pro and office 2010 with setup and delivery for 1500 each to a customer and they liked the systems so much I will be building 3 more next month.
Just my opinion but it is working for me.

 

[PCX]

I would have to agree with Mushin. Unless this is your main bread and butter, it probably wont be worth doing, at least not right now. Also, some other have mentioned that it is hard to compete with manufactured PCs, it really is especially since you can get a really nice Asus and just upgrade the memory and graphics pretty cheap.

 

[Wheelie]

I stay way too busy servicing computers to invest the time it takes building them. What I do is buy new computers from Dell & Lenovo and resell them with a 20% markup. In 90% of the cases where I sell one - I get hired to install it, transfer data, connect to the Internet, and set up with a printer - giving me 2 hours of paid service labor. Let's say I make $120 on the markup, and $200 in labor installing it ... that's $320 profit per PC. And Dell or Lenovo handles any warranty issues!

Doing it this way I do not have a lot of time invested specifying and inventorying parts, assembling PC's, installing the OS, etc. After the sale there may also be parts & labor issues honoring the warranty if it breaks down.

Building computers seems like hours and hours of time wasted that could be used making money servicing computers instead.

 

[hightechrex]

I would have to agree with Mushin. Unless this is your main bread and butter, it probably wont be worth doing, at least not right now. Also, some other have mentioned that it is hard to compete with manufactured PCs, it really is especially since you can get a really nice Asus and just upgrade the memory and graphics pretty cheap.

You brought back a dead post from like 4 months ago to tell me the same thing 3 pages of people have been telling me? lmaoo thanks

 

[pc-quebec]

...... Manufacturers do not offer liquid cooling, overclocking, eyefinity, etc. THESE are the services and tweaks that i want to offer with my machines.

Do you have experience with WC ? It’s not something to improvise. Peoples who want them are usually members of forums; they will put pics of their builds, others members will comment . Better be good at it, because they gone come back. Sleeving also, peoples who want WC systems, want all their wires individually sleeved. And they want it the color they want, so you need inventory. Do you have the tools to do so , I quite often cut a 120mm hole to accommodate an extra fan, or I cut the top of the case to accommodate a triple rad, when it's not a quad like in the Corsair 800d.

 

[hightechrex]

Do you have experience with WC ? It’s not something to improvise. Peoples who want them are usually members of forums; they will put pics of their builds, others members will comment . Better be good at it, because they gone come back. Sleeving also, peoples who want WC systems, want all their wires individually sleeved. And they want it the color they want, so you need inventory. Do you have the tools to do so , I quite often cut a 120mm hole to accommodate an extra fan, or I cut the top of the case to accommodate a triple rad, when it's not a quad like in the Corsair 800d.

I have no problem with doing any of that. All the machines that i've built for myself were made to the same standard