Procurement departments are set up to negotiate the best price for their corporation’s needed commodities.  This works tremendously well for manufactured goods with little to no variables affecting the outcome of the product.  When dealing with roofing, unit pricing has extreme repercussions for corporations due to the number of variables that come into play when constructing a roof onsite.   

There is no cookie cutter approach that can be generalized to every roofing project.  If a roofing vender works under a unit pricing structure, the outcome of their projects will vary.  Imagine this, a roof vender states they will install all of your roofing systems for X number of dollars per square foot.  Take a look at what this means for the following situations.

Project #1

This is a simple open roof system resulting in an easy  tear off of the old roof system and easy installation of the new roof system.   Project was completed prior to its estimated timeframe and a good roof system was installed.  If a contractor had bid this project independently instead of using the price structure set up by the unit pricing, they would have been able to save the company tens of thousands of dollars because of the ease of the project.

Project #2

This is a complex roof with several penetrations and several layers of roofing material resulting in a difficult tear off of the old system and challenging installation for the new roof system.  Project went way over the estimated time frame.  Roofing employees were in a time crunch to get the roof up and completed as fast as possible. Roofing employees cut several corners to accomplish this task. The roofing vender experienced a great loss of profit while the corporation received an inadequate roof system.  If a contractor had bid this project independently instead of using the price structure set up by the unit pricing, they would have been able to account for the additional challenges with this roof system and taken the necessary measures to ensure the corporation would receive a quality roof system.

Solution