Free tool

What does an hour of your press actually cost?

Most shops guess this number. The guess is almost always low, because it leaves out the equipment payment, the owner's own pay, or the hours the press sits idle. Every quote you write inherits that error.

Put your real monthly costs in below and you get your break-even press hour, live. Nothing is saved and nothing is sent anywhere.

The one people get wrong is utilization: the share of your production hours a press is actually printing paid work. Setup, art, teardown and waiting on approvals are not it. Half is a normal answer for a busy shop.

Read: What an hour on your press actually costs

Now put in your own numbers.

Monthly overhead

Rent / Mortgage

Utilities

Insurance

Software / Subs

Shop Supplies

Equipment payments / leases

press, dryer or vehicle loans, the line most people forget

Other fixed

phone, internet, marketing, accounting, fees

Labor

Payroll (net)

Owner draw

what you would pay someone to do your job

Labor Burden %

payroll taxes, workers comp, benefits, as a percent of wages

Hours

Days / Month

Production Hours / Day

total press hours across all your presses

Press Utilization %

the share of those hours a press is actually printing paid work; most shops overestimate this

Your numbers

Monthly nut
Billable hours / month

Break-even rate

/hr

What one press hour costs you before a cent of profit.

Margin

Your PrintGrid shop settings

These are the same eleven fields PrintGrid asks for, with your numbers in them.

PrintGrid field	Your value

Build your pricing matrix from this rate

This one number is where PrintGrid starts. It takes your rate and turns it into every quantity and color break you quote, with a heatmap showing where the margin holds and where it quietly disappears.

See PrintGrid

What does an hour of your press actually cost?

Your numbers

Your PrintGrid shop settings

Build your pricing matrix from this rate

Get the Shop Rate Worksheet