There is no professionally prepared tender that cannot be beaten by a lump sum price from a desperate cowboy

Much of my time as the owner manager of an architectural mouldings contractor is spent with clients and architects helping them realise their dreams.

We are always expected to do this for free. When I first entered the industry in the early eighties we would get fully-designed finishes that required us to do no more than manufacturing schedules. Now we get 'concept drawings' or 'mood images' for us to develop into a constructable end result.

More at Terry Wright's blog