One of the reasons why I was attracted to the locksmith business was because of my interest in numbers. Whether it is key codes, depth and space measurements or profit and loss statements, numbers play a big role in our business on a daily basis.
It is hard to compare the prices we pay today with the prices our parents paid a few decades ago. As example, my parents purchased their home in Chicago for $4500 in the 1940s. During my teen years I answered the phone at our lock shop during my summer vacations. I used a prepared price sheet for quoting jobs and can still remember that we furnished and installed Segal 666 jimmyproofs for $16.95 and Segal 688 jimmyproofs for $19.95. Most duplicate keys were 35 cents each.
Costs and prices have certainly skyrocketed since those days. The word 'inflation' has become an important part of our language. Long ago during my high school days several of us would contribute our loose change then fill a friend's jalopy with one dollar of gas and drive around all evening. Now we expect to pay 20 or 30 dollars for the same tank of gasoline. An interesting sidebar to gasoline prices is that only a few powerful companies control the marketplace and prices per gallon curiously rise and fall in unison.
In the last few years news for the consumer has gotten better. The Internet has many sites where statistical information can be found. Interest rates are at an all time low. The inflation rate this September was minus .04%. People on Social Security will not obtain a raise for 2016 since raises are determined by the consumer price index which has decreased between 2014 and 2015. Gasoline prices on the futures market are at the lowest cost since March, 2009. Check www.BLS.gov and look at the average food and energy prices as compiled by the government for additional cost information.
It appears that our honeymoon with steady product costs is coming to an end. Our family locksmith business has been notified by locksmith distributors that several popular lock manufacturers will be raising their prices in the next 30 days. We are all in business to make a profit. Watch your distributor product costs closely from now on to make sure that you are not selling products below the new higher price of goods.
