Which of Your Jobs Actually Made Money?

Quick question: which of your jobs actually made money last month?

Not booked. Not paid. Made money, after the labor, the drive time, the gear wear and the commission.

Most of us guess. We know what we charged. We have a feeling about what it cost. And the feeling is usually kinder than the math.

Every Job Is Its Own Mini P&L

Job costing means reading every job left to right, like its own little profit and loss statement:

What we charged, minus what it really cost us to deliver, equals gross profit.

Then you turn that gross profit into a margin (gross profit divided by revenue) and hold it up against the target margin you set for your business.

One thing to know: this is job profit, before overhead. It still has to cover your rent, insurance, software, marketing and you before it becomes bottom line profit. That's exactly why each job needs to clear its target.

That's it. The hard part isn't the math. The hard part is being honest about the cost.

The Costs Owners Forget

When owners job cost for the first time, the same lines go missing:

1. Your own time. If you work the event yourself, your prep, event and travel hours are cost too. Pick an hourly rate for your own time and use it every time.
2. Labor, all of it. Not just the hours of the event. Setup, load out and drive time are hours too, and hours are cost. Put labor on its own lines, even when the client never sees a price for it.
3. Your assistants and attendants. Every person who works the job, at what they really cost you per hour.
4. Vehicles. Mileage or vehicle rental. The van doesn't drive for free.
5. Gear wear. Every event takes a little life out of your equipment.
6. Sales commission. If someone gets paid to book it, that's a cost of the job.
7. Labor burden. If you have employees, payroll costs on top of hourly pay add up. Check the right percentage with your bookkeeper or accountant. Contractors are entered at what you actually pay them.

Every business has its own lines. A caterer costs ingredients, kitchen prep and service staff hours. A planner costs prep and meeting hours, event day hours and travel. A venue costs staffing, cleaning and utilities for the day.

Leave those out and almost every job looks great. Put them in and you find out which ones really are.

Run This Check on Your Most Popular Package

Start with one package, the one you sell the most:

1. Do you know what it really costs you to deliver, setup and load out and drive time included?
2. Do you know your margin on it, as a percent?
3. If your costs went up 10% tomorrow, would you know what to charge?

Can't answer one? That's your job costing gap. Cost that package first, then do one more each week until your whole price list is done.

Price the Next Job With the End in Mind

Once you know the real cost, pricing gets simple. To hit a target margin, price the job at:

Total cost divided by (1 minus your target margin).

For example, at a 60% target (pick your own; this isn't a benchmark), a job that costs you $760 to deliver should be priced at $1,900.

There's a shortcut, too. We call it the Rules of X: what multiplying your cost gets you in margin.

• Cost times 1.5 is a 33% margin
• Cost times 2 is a 50% margin
• Cost times 2.5 is a 60% margin
• Cost times 3 is a 67% margin
• Cost times 4 is a 75% margin

So if your target is 60%, the quick check is: am I charging at least two and a half times what this job costs me?

Three Things to Remember

• Every transaction does not need to be profitable. Every client relationship does.
• A loss leader is a choice, not an accident. If a job loses money, it should be because you decided it would.
• You control your profit when you sell, so cost it before you quote it.

Try It: The Free Job Costing Calculator

We built a free calculator that does all of this for you. It opens with a sample wedding event already costed, so you can see how it works. Then clear it and cost one of your own. It shows your real margin, colors it against your target, and tells you what to charge. Nothing you type is saved or sent anywhere.

Open the free Job Costing Calculator

Want a version built around your own business, one that saves your jobs and your price list? That's the kind of tool we teach owners to build with AI, with no code.

Job costing is part of what we work on inside Mentor Pods, because it changes every pricing decision after it. If you want help costing every package you sell, talk to our team.