I’ve worked with enough companies to tell you this is one of the biggest silent killers of profit in the trades. Most owners don’t actually know what it costs them to do the work. They think they’re charging enough, but their books tell a different story. They’ll sell a water heater or a panel upgrade and still wonder why the business is living paycheck to paycheck.

“Well, the Other Guys Are Charging X…”

I hear it all the time: “The other shop down the road charges $4,500 for this system. We’ll just match it.”

Wrong move.

Every business has different costs. Sure, we all deal with payroll, trucks, fuel, insurance, and materials but the amounts vary drastically. If you’re paying your techs top dollar, offering real benefits, and delivering five-star service, your prices need to reflect that. And that’s not a bad thing. You’re providing a premium experience.

But if your pricebook doesn’t account for your labor burden, overhead, and target margins, then you’re flying blind.

Let me put it like this: the cheapest guy is cheap for a reason. And nine times out of ten, he’s not making any money.

Why a Detailed Pricebook Changes Everything

A robust, dialed-in pricebook isn’t just about pricing consistently. It’s about knowing your business inside and out. When you build your pricebook the right way, you gain total visibility into:

• What you're selling

• What it costs you to sell it

• How much profit you're making

• Where you can negotiate, and where you absolutely can’t

That’s real control. If a tech calls from the field and says, “I need to cut a deal to close this,” you can look at the job and know exactly where your floor is. No guessing. No giving it away.

ServiceTitan (or Any Platform) Is Only as Good as What You Feed It

In ServiceTitan, and the same is true for any platform, everything runs off your pricebook. It powers your forms, reporting, materials usage, estimates, and invoices. If your pricebook is garbage, then all those automations and dashboards are built on a broken foundation.

It’s like trying to run a race car on bald tires. You won’t get far, and you might crash trying.

Bottom Line: Don’t Guess. Know.

If you want to run a real business one that scales, turns a profit, and doesn’t keep you up at night you’ve got to stop pricing based on feel. You need to start building based on actual numbers.

Yes, it takes time to get your pricebook right. You’ve got to track real job costs, review your labor burden, factor in material costs, and bake in healthy margins. But once it’s done, you won’t go back. You’ll make faster decisions, stop second-guessing your pricing, and most importantly, you’ll be profitable on purpose.