Bespoke Manufacturing Quotation Software Case Study

The challenge

At JK Kitchen, a stainless-steel fabricator in Pune, every quotation started as a copy of an older spreadsheet, which meant the pricing logic in circulation was whatever happened to be embedded in the file somebody duplicated that morning. Sheet material rates, wastage allowances, fabrication time and margin had all been adjusted locally over the years, so two estimators pricing a comparable counter could arrive at different numbers for reasons nobody could reconstruct afterwards. Because dimensions were typed rather than modelled, an error in a single cell propagated silently through material and labour, and the customer received a document that gave no visual confirmation that the unit being priced was the unit they had described. Approval was informal, so discounts were applied in the sheet without any record of who authorised them or against which cost base.

The approach

We separated the things that change often from the things that must not change casually. Material rates, wastage factors, labour rates and standard fabrication operations became governed reference data with an owner and an effective date, while the estimator works only with the dimensions and options of the actual job. The quote is then computed from parameters rather than typed, so a change to a length or a gauge flows through material, cut, weld time and finishing without anyone editing a formula. A parametric 3D preview renders the configured unit as it is priced, which turns a specification error into something visible rather than something arithmetical. Finished quotes are issued as a shareable link with versioning, and any discount beyond a defined threshold requires approval that is recorded against the quote.

The outcome

Two estimators pricing the same specification now produce the same number, because the rates and allowances are held once rather than embedded in whichever file was copied, and a rate change takes effect on new quotes from its effective date instead of spreading gradually through the team. The 3D preview means a wrong dimension is usually caught by the person who typed it, since an incorrect unit looks wrong before it is sent, and the customer approves something they have seen rather than a table of line items. Sending a link rather than a document means the quote the client opens is the current version, revisions are visible as revisions, and every discount carries a record of who approved it against which cost base, so margin can be examined after the fact rather than inferred.

Made-to-order manufacturers end up in spreadsheets for a rational reason: no packaged product knows their fabrication rules, and Excel will do whatever they ask. The cost arrives later, when the rules exist in several dozen files and nobody can say which of them is correct.

Moving the rules into one governed place while leaving the estimator free to configure the job is what changes the outcome, and it is the premise Sazinga Quote is built on. The 3D preview is not decoration; it is the fastest way a human notices that the numbers describe the wrong object.