Aerial Mapping Pricing Rates

[Novum Dives]

Yes, let's get real.

You can agree or disagree all you want, but it doesn't change answer. Whether discussing pricing is or isn't collusive doesn't really matter. People share or choose not to share pricing for many reasons, and my contention is that the fear of violating ethics rules or laws etc around price fixing is one of them. While I know for a fact no anti-trust authorities are perusing obscure drone forums looking for anti-trust violations, my industry experience tells me they're not completely unfounded concerns; it's something people do think about whether right, wrong or indifferent. YMMV.

To be clear and fair, there are other reasons that people don't share pricing, like not sharing with possible competitors, protecting a niche, etc. Drawing a line from "fostering an open exchange of ideas and experiences" to everyone openly sharing pricing is foolish. No one's fear mongering, either. If you won't go into business because people won't give you a direct blueprint to success, then you shouldn't be in business to begin with. Everyone wants the shortcut and easy answers these days, it seems. The ideas shared should revolve around how to be a better pilot, offer unique and awesome services, and so on. You think this is the first time someone on a forum has complained about people not being forthcoming with pricing? This thread has been written hundreds of times, on hundreds of forums over the years. Yawn.

 

[BigAl07]

^^^^^^ @Novum Dives nailed it.

 

[Consultant]

To be clear and fair, there are other reasons that people don't share pricing, like not sharing with possible competitors, protecting a niche, etc.

Umm, any intelligent competitor can get the other competitor's pricing if they want it. There's a variety of methods you can employ. So that statement is laughable. I have a spreadsheet all filled out for all the competitors in my area. It does take some brains in some instances with certain competitors that think they can identify the fishers but it's quite easy to outsmart them. The people that can't figure out how to get the information would probably not survive in the long-run anyway. So if you think abstaining from discussing numbers online is going to maintain your pricing confidentially or your hold in a niche, you're just telling yourself what you want to hear.

I'm always interested in pricing methods and rates in areas worldwide though. Which is why I enjoy discussing it on the forums.

 

[Chrisedge]

Like any business, you want to be efficient. One person doing RE photos at $99 - $149 can be under pricing themselves, or know how to bang them out, and make money at $99. How long do you fly + time in post-processing (this can kill you) + other costs + profit = How much to charge.

 

[Theo450]

Like any business, you want to be efficient. One person doing RE photos at $99 - $149 can be under pricing themselves, or know how to bang them out, and make money at $99. How long do you fly + time in post-processing (this can kill you) + other costs + profit = How much to charge.

Don't forget about mission planning, premobilization, demobilization, maintenance and record keeping, Insurance and equipment costs.

 

[Richard E]

So from what I've read here $125 per hour might be a good place to start and adjust accordingly. Thanks for the thread to the OP.

 

[nwairphotos]

It's total BS that sharing pricing on forum is some kind of "collusion" or against anti-trust laws, etc.

Also, it's not much help just stating that someone should price their work to cover their costs and time, etc. What the market will bear is what is more relevant.

I've done exactly one map that I've charged for. I'm disappointed in that I haven't been able to get more interest in this. Maybe I need to be more aggressive with my marketing and sales. I do have another client I have yet to photograph, that I terribly underpriced just to get the work and experience. The one I charged for and was paid was for a large cemetery for $200.00. The others are four very large industrial sites I priced at $250.00 each. Two of them will need two batteries. They are over 300 miles away, so I want to work them in with some other work. I feel that they are worth $400.00 to $450.00 each, but that's not what I proposed and I don't know if they would have been able to budget that.

 

[Consultant]

So from what I've read here $125 per hour might be a good place to start and adjust accordingly. Thanks for the thread to the OP.

The question is, per hour of WHAT? To execute a job from start to finish requires a lot more time than the time you spend onsite with the drone. From the moment the customer asks for a quote to the point you receive payment can eat up a lot more time. So if you think in your hear, will take me about 15 minutes to setup, 30 minutes of flight time and 15 minutes to packup = a 1-hour job, THINK AGAIN.

- Responding to an RFP or request for a quote depending on the complexity of the job could easily take an hour right there. In many cases you need to go back and forth with the client teasing out all the details they never thought of to this point that you need in to recommend the appropriate service and work out the cost.

- Dealing with the FAA and local authorities can also take a bit of time when necessary.

- Planning the mission can take a lot of time depending on the complexity and size of the job.

- Scheduling with the client and then coordinating and communicating with any on-site personnel can take up a surprising amount of time.

- Sitting in traffic on the way to and from the job site can take a heck of a lot of time.

- Even if you are doing no post processing and just delivery raw untouched photo and or video files, reviewing them for quality, organizing and providing them to the client still takes time.

- Educating the client on how to access/view/use the data is in many cases necessary also - this is a pretty new industry.

- When post processing is necesary, it can take a lot more time than you originally estimated.

- Hounding the Accounts Receivable Dept of a client that is late on payment takes time too.

* All the stuff that's not tied to a specific job, like purchasing and maintaing equipment, paying bills/taxes, reading forum posts, etc etc are your general business overhead costs and those should be factored into your rate.

Moral of the story, don't undersell yourself. A job that might be two hour of your time on-site, may actually from start to finish take more like 8 hours if you diligently kept track of your time. You just went from charging $200 for a "2 hour job" to netting $25/hr. LOL. Now if you are doing this as a hobby for enjoyment and not trying to make a living, then forget everything I just said, but keep your day job.

In the engineering field I believe the rule of thumb is take the design spec necessary to meet the requirements and design it to handle double. Or at least 1.5X.

 

[Theo450]

The question is, per hour of WHAT? To execute a job from start to finish requires a lot more time than the time you spend onsite with the drone. From the moment the customer asks for a quote to the point you receive payment can eat up a lot more time. So if you think in your hear, will take me about 15 minutes to setup, 30 minutes of flight time and 15 minutes to packup = a 1-hour job, THINK AGAIN.

- Responding to an RFP or request for a quote depending on the complexity of the job could easily take an hour right there. In many cases you need to go back and forth with the client teasing out all the details they never thought of to this point that you need in to recommend the appropriate service and work out the cost.

- Dealing with the FAA and local authorities can also take a bit of time when necessary.

- Planning the mission can take a lot of time depending on the complexity and size of the job.

- Scheduling with the client and then coordinating and communicating with any on-site personnel can take up a surprising amount of time.

- Sitting in traffic on the way to and from the job site can take a heck of a lot of time.

- Even if you are doing no post processing and just delivery raw untouched photo and or video files, reviewing them for quality, organizing and providing them to the client still takes time.

- Educating the client on how to access/view/use the data is in many cases necessary also - this is a pretty new industry.

- When post processing is necesary, it can take a lot more time than you originally estimated.

- Hounding the Accounts Receivable Dept of a client that is late on payment takes time too.

* All the stuff that's not tied to a specific job, like purchasing and maintaing equipment, paying bills/taxes, reading forum posts, etc etc are your general business overhead costs and those should be factored into your rate.

Moral of the story, don't undersell yourself. A job that might be two hour of your time on-site, may actually from start to finish take more like 8 hours if you diligently kept track of your time. You just went from charging $200 for a "2 hour job" to netting $25/hr. LOL. Now if you are doing this as a hobby for enjoyment and not trying to make a living, then forget everything I just said, but keep your day job.

In the engineering field I believe the rule of thumb is take the design spec necessary to meet the requirements and design it to handle double. Or at least 1.5X.

Very good advice.

 

[bluelight support]

It all depends - as ive said on inspire pilots, what are you trying to achieve.

Someone who is looking at adding on a "mapping" service on top of video might think ive already got the kit so just add a little bit for cloud processing, and if thats the way your going your going to find yourselves biting off more than you can chew. The drone is one of the most least important things in mapping among all the other equipment and software you need. You can forget any of these cloud based systems for any serious mapping, as none of them allow manual tie points, or manual tweaking or editing, so your deliverable is like it or lump it - no good for anything other than a pretty image.

Factor in 5-20k of computer hardware to be able to process the imagery, and £3-15k for processing software, and 7-15k of gnss equipment to get ground control points, and if you dont understand WSG84 or geoid, then forget it - I researched for 2 years and then went back to uni for a masters degree just to understand mapping

Only then can I consider selling 1cm/pix ground resolution mapping for clients, and give them deliverables in Autocad Civil 3d, or ESRI, so factor in £3-16k for a workstation license for that also.

now you have all that, and you know how to use it, it would be very straight forward to work out your cost of sales, cost of acquisition then work your pricing from there.

 

[regfran]

I have done 4 mapping flights using drone deploy APP and my galaxy S8. It works perfectly. I have shot orthographic and also used the orbit feature to create more 3 d definition on test flights. I was hired by drone base for this. They pay $140 for local flights. They offered me a flight at a site 5 hours away for $250. I declined. Doing local flights for them is easy as you do not have make the map, just upload images. It's a good way to build time. I am still looking for other customers to make my own flights and maps. I think I would charge by the acre and try and get $500 for a mapping flight and map. Learning about 3d objects and map making is complex. There should be a market for this in construction, surveying and engineering, but this seem like a new field.

Drone deploy subscription is $90 per month.

Here is an example(drone deploy gives you a month free to try out making maps).