Fifteen dollars. Ten points of margin. The kind of gap that stays invisible until someone runs the numbers to determine the cost of one pest control service.
"If I was charging $100, my gross profit before anything else, if I subtract that $72, is about $28, or 28%," says Kendra Snyder, general manager of Quest Termite & Pest Management in Hellertown, Pa.
"But if I increase that cost to $115, $15 more, not a whole lot of money, then my profit goes up to about $43 and that increases my margin to about 38%."
The $72 isn't one number. It's eight, stacked, and most operators only ever see the first two.
Snyder doesn't guess at her margins. Here are the full metrics she tracks on every route and her advice for thinking about each one.
The single biggest line on the P&L, and it's not just the paycheck.
Total up a technician's full cost, wage plus training, uniforms, and healthcare, before you treat any of it as a separate budget item.
The longer a job takes, the higher the labor cost.
Knowing your average time per service type can help you price accurately.
Not billable, but not free. You're still paying for every mile.
Build routes with technician input. A route appearing quick could need an adjustment.
"I know you put this at this time of day and it makes sense on the route, but I'm going through four school zones and it's going to take me an hour. It's a mile, but it's the longest mile of my life, so don't do it between this hour and this hour." – a technician
Fewer stops means lower productivity and a higher cost per stop.
Tie production to pay. Technicians who see the link between stops and their paycheck stay motivated to work efficiently.
Fuel, maintenance, and repairs, plus purchase, insurance, registration, and depreciation. Snyder treats depreciation as the last number in this line, not a separate one.
Watch the fuel trend over time, not the daily price. Then account for the full vehicle picture, not just what's at the pump.
A return trip cuts into margin twice: the drive back and whatever caused it.
Ask whether a callback traces to a training gap, a pricing miss, or an ongoing issue, then fix that root cause.
What it costs to win a customer, and what it costs to keep one.
Map your densest customer areas before you spend, so new leads tighten your routes instead of stretching them.
Administrative labor, software, and insurance running underneath every visible cost.
Fold your full overhead allocation into the per-technician math, not just the obvious line items.
"It might be our company, but it's not. At the end of the day, my job is to make sure everyone gets paid." – Snyder
Want to read more on this topic? Check out "The $72 Question: How Quest Termite Prices Every Job" on the FieldRoutes blog.
