Underpriced or Unbilled Make-Ready Services
Definition
Make-ready is a legitimate, labor- and material-intensive service. When quoted as a lump sum, complex jobs appear equally priced to simple jobs. This creates: (1) customer expectation misalignment, (2) reduced willingness to pay for rush/complex jobs, (3) margin compression on custom work. Printers unaware of true make-ready cost cannot price competitively or profitably.
Key Findings
- Financial Impact: Estimated 2-5% revenue leakage on 30-50% of jobs; typical AUD 500k-2M print shop loses AUD 10,000-100,000 annually in underpriced make-ready
- Frequency: Every job quote; ongoing margin erosion
- Root Cause: Lack of transparent costing systems; make-ready bundled into production cost rather than itemized as separate service; customer education gap on setup complexity
Why This Matters
The Pitch: Australian print shops lose 2-8% of gross margin on complex jobs by not transparently charging for make-ready. Itemizing setup costs and offering premium 'quick-turnaround' services recovers AUD 10,000-50,000 annually per shop.
Affected Stakeholders
Estimators/quoters, Sales, Finance/accounting, Production managers
Deep Analysis (Premium)
Financial Impact
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Current Workarounds
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Methodology & Sources
Data collected via OSINT from regulatory filings, industry audits, and verified case studies.
Related Business Risks
Production Downtime During Press Make-Ready
Material Waste in Make-Ready Sheets and Ink Setup
Approval Delay Bottleneck
Rework and Reprint Costs from Unclear Revision Scope
Unbilled Proof and Revision Services
Customer Dissatisfaction from Manual Proof Workflows
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