Hey guys what do you guys charge for hanging Christmas lights up? Do you charge by the length? Or by the difficulty/time it takes?
A few of my window customers asked if I do it and I’ve only ever done my own house. They have all their own lights already by the way.
Most have a per foot charge.
When getting started it is common to install client provided lights but once you get some clients under your belt most stop. It is just a headache and kills morale.
We charge between $4 and $5 per foot depending on how hard the job is, which includes renting the lights from us. At this price we don’t expect to make much in year in year one when we have to buy the lights (30-50/hr), but should make decent money in subsequent years (70-100/hr).
So at $4-5 to start, you don’t lower the price each subsequent year after the first year, right?
Correct, I keep the price the same so I can make good money off them in later years. I present it to the customer as a light rental, which includes custom fitting the lights to the house, offseason storage, maintenance, and free service calls if something goes out. I’m taking all the risk of them not having us hang them again by not requiring a contract, or for them to purchase the lights up front. If I were to drop the price down in later years, I’d increase the price in year one to more like $6/foot to mitigate my risk. I know other companies that make the customer buy the lights up front, then just charge for labor, and then $100/year for offseason storage. I’ve gotten good feed back from customers who like that my price is all inclusive, and they never have to worry about anything.
Cool, thanks for your response. I’m basically doing the same thing 
Do you only offer one type of Christmas lights?
Sorry for the late reply. Yea, I just do the C9 strands at this point. I’ll talk to people about special ordering other decorations, but not many people are wanting to spend extra money after their quote. I’m moving more toward $4/foot on the residential.
What methods do you guys use to estimate linear feet for the rooflines?
