Price parking lots, walks and seasonal contracts from your own costs
Your truck, plow, insurance, salt storage and crew go in once, before the first storm. After that, every site is priced from what it takes to plow, salt and shovel, not from a number the last contractor left behind.
- Know what a storm hour really costs Insurance with slip-and-fall cover, the yard, the plow truck and your crew's pay become one break-even rate, spread over the few months you can bill.
- Price the whole push, not just the plowing Plowing and stacking, salting the lot, the walks and entry doors, salt and ice melt, and the drive each get their own line.
- Quote per push, per month and per season Light storms, 6 to 12 inches, over 12 inches and a one-time push come out side by side, with the monthly payment and the season total.
- Stop paying for storm-night work nobody bid Pre-trip time, site logs and photos, cutting edges and refreeze salt runs sit on a checklist that has to be answered.
- Hand the property manager a clean estimate One page with per-push, monthly and seasonal prices and your snow terms, ready to print or save as a PDF.
- See which sites paid this winter The Job Log records every bid, won or lost, and the real hours and salt each site took.
- One-time payment, no subscription
- Instant download
- Excel and Google Sheets
How it turns plow minutes, salt and the drive into a per-push and seasonal price
Six tabs take you from the salt pile to a signed estimate, and after the winter, to a look at what each site really cost.
- Start HereShows the fill-in order and the cell colours. Do it one evening before the snow flies.
- Shop SetupInsurance, yard and salt storage, the plow truck, the snowblower and your crew, turned into the break-even rate every storm hour has to hit.
- Price ListBulk salt, bagged salt, ice melt, lot markers, cutting edges and plow parts, each dated so you know when to call the supplier again.
- QuoteMinutes to plow, salt and clear the walks, the drive from the last site and the checklist. It gives the price per push for each storm depth, the monthly payment, the season, and a one-time start-up charge for staking the lot.
- Customer QuoteThe estimate the property manager signs: service, trigger depth, prices and terms.
- Job LogEvery site you bid, won or lost, and the hours and salt it really took.
What is a break-even rate? Snow pays its whole year in a few months. The break-even rate is what every billable hour of plowing, salting and shoveling has to earn to pay the crew, the owner, the truck payments and the insurance for the full year, before any profit. What you bill above it is profit. The snow removal hourly rate page shows how it's worked out.
Prefilled example built-in
The file comes filled in with a made-up snow plowing company and its $380.12 per-push parking lot quote, so you see a finished quote before you type in your own numbers.
The sample company is an owner-operator with one shoveler, with a break-even of $83.71 per billable hour. The site is a 20,000 sq ft dental office lot: plow the lot, clear 200 ft of walks and 3 entry doors, then salt the lot and ice-melt the walks after every push, at a 1.5 inch trigger from November to March.
| A | B | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Part of the price, per push (1.5 to 6 in) | Amount |
| 2 | Salt, plowing, walks and the drive | $239.62 |
| 3 | Easy-to-miss costs (pre-trip, site log, plow wear) | $27.14 |
| 4 | Salt markup, cushion and profit | $113.36 |
| 5 | Price per push | $380.12 |
At about 3 pushes a month billed over 5 months, that is $1,140.36 a month and $5,701.82 for a 15-push season. The $113.36 a push is kept after every wage, the owner's included, and the site earns about $165.52 per labour hour. The full method is on how much to charge for snow plowing parking lots.
$407
That is what the easy-to-miss lines alone added to a winter of about 15 pushes at this example lot. It is about 8 times what the calculator costs. Miss them once and the file has paid for itself.
- One-time payment, no subscription
- Instant download
- Excel and Google Sheets
Why a copied snow bid has to cover a whole year from a few storms
Many snow bids start from what the last contractor charged the property. That number can't tell you whether it paid for a year of truck payments and insurance out of fifteen storms, whether it counted the salt runs for refreeze, or how far your yard is from the site.
Here is the math. In the sample, the owner is paid for 700 hours a year but only about half of those are plowing, salting and shoveling on sites; the rest is waiting on storms, loading salt, fixing plows and driving. A price built on the wage alone would be about half of what each billable hour really needs.
The calculator starts from the year's costs and the hours you can really bill, then prices each push, deep storm and season from them. You still hand over a simple per-push and seasonal number, but one that pays for the winter.
Pre-trip, site logs, plow wear and the other storm-night costs it catches
The Quote tab won't mark an estimate ready until each of these lines has a Yes, No or N/A:
- Pre-trip time in the yard: loading salt, warming the truck, checking hydraulics.
- The site log and photos that answer a slip-and-fall claim months later.
- Cutting edges, hydraulic leaks and plow repairs, spread over the pushes.
- Curbs, turf and snapped markers you'll be fixing in spring.
- Staking the lot and walking the site, charged once as a start-up line.
- Extra salt runs for refreeze. Left as No in the example on purpose, so the warning stays until you decide how many salt-only visits a storm brings.
Exactly what you get
One .xlsx spreadsheet, delivered the instant you check out. Opens in Excel and Google Sheets. No subscription or login, and nothing billed each winter.
- The six-tab calculator, set up for per-push and seasonal snow work.
- A complete example snow company, with its dental office lot priced for the whole winter.
- Snow terms you can edit, covering a snowfall cap on seasonal prices, no refund in a light winter, salting after every push, staking before freeze-up and late sign-ups.
- A Job Log that shows which sites ran over their hours and salt, the habit covered in job costing.
How it compares
Most owners price a job one of these ways. Here is what each one gives you.
| Copying another company's price | A free estimate template | Estimating software | This calculator | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starts from your own costs | No | No | Varies | Yes |
| Makes you answer the easy-to-miss costs | No | No | Varies | Yes |
| Shows which jobs made money | No | No | Varies | Yes |
| Works in Excel and Google Sheets | – | Yes | No | Yes |
| Cost | Free | Free | Usually a monthly fee | $49.95 once |
Who it's for: plow owners and small snow crews
It fits owner-operators and snow crews of about 1 to 15 people plowing commercial lots, HOAs and driveway routes, and landscapers adding snow who want to know what a push really costs. One truck or a fleet with skid steers, small driveways or acre lots, seasonal or per-push customers, every site is priced from its own minutes and salt, so your mix of work fits.
It is not for big snow contractors already running route software with job costing, homeowners checking what plowing should cost, or anyone after a blank bid form to fill in by hand. It doesn't price roof snow removal or snow hauling on their own lines. For your hourly number only, use the free true hourly rate calculator.
Stop bidding lots from what the last contractor charged. Price every push and season from your own salt, truck, crew and drive, catch the storm-night costs that usually get missed, and see which sites made money.
Snow Plowing Pricing Calculator
$49.95 one-time
Buy now and download- One-time payment, no subscription
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- Excel and Google Sheets