No price sheet?

Is it weird that the yard I prefer around me doens't have a price sheet or a sheet listing their grades of material?

I called them up because I wanted to sort my copper/aluminum properly to get best grade.

They said they don't have a price sheet, and they don't have anything that they can send out other than what types of metal they take (i.e. copper, steel, aluminum, brass, etc)

The main yard I use also doesn't have a price sheet. They never have. These yards may be reselling to a larger yard and basing their prices on the weekly price sheet they get. I'm not sure why they don't publish a sheet of their own with the prices adjusted, but they don't.

Mine don't either, just about got to learn it as you go. Every once in awhile when I don't know, I'll call and ask.
Then before going call to ask current prices on each.

Neither of my yards have a price sheet. They encourage you to call the day you are coming down for their current prices so you know before you come to the yard. When I asked for a price sheet, they both gave me a sheet....of what they buy with no prices on it.

Originally Posted by Mudlucky

Neither of my yards have a price sheet. They encourage you to call the day you are coming down for their current prices so you know before you come to the yard. When I asked for a price sheet, they both gave me a sheet....of what they buy with no prices on it.

the yard I use, and the 2 nearby that I only use in emergencies are the same way. Call for pricing. I have heard this is so people don't try to use old price sheets, or take the sheet somewhere else to use as a bargaining aid.

Be nice to the scale people. sort things the best you can, they will notice that you make thier job easier. Ask them how hey want it sorted. Try not to take up thier whole day with questions, maybe 1-3 at a time. after a while, they might start taking things out of your buckets and moving them to the higher paying buckets.

The non ferrous crew loves me, someone with 100lbs in a pickup takes 20 min to weigh, then I back in with 250lbs sorted and am out of there in 10 min.

I do the same thing at my yard for a myriad of reasons.

For one, even if I sent you a price sheet, it would have your head reeling. There are so many categories on there that the layman would not understand (i.e the different flavors of aluminum..3003, 5052, 6063 10/10).

Another problem is that prices do change all the time. I personally started refusing to issue price sheets after a couple incidents where I sent them out, the market dropped a few days later and I could no longer honor that price. The customers ended up getting pissed at me, and accusing me of running a bait and switch scam at my yard. Funny thing is, I never once got cussed out when the prices went up and I paid more for their scrap! People need to realize that these are traded commodities, like gold, and can go up and down all the time.

Yet another problem I had was me sending a price sheet and customers rubbing my prices against competitors to get the best price. I'm sorry this isn't Walmart. While I will occasionally match a competitor's price, I still need to maintain a comfortable margin.

I always encourage customers to call me for the most current pricing. I will make an exception on e-scrap occasionally because these commodities aren't as volatile as copper, stainless etc.

No price sheet here as well. Got to call. New place opened up paying 185 ton for steel, called for other prices, all were lower than my normal yard...

my yard has online prices as well as price sheets. they both clearly state prices may change without notice.

for a general price sheet, I just use my most recent receipt to get an idea of what I should get when I go.

My situation is a bit different, being that I'm strictly a converter and core buyer, but I do put out an updated weekly price sheet. My local competitors won't do this, and I think I know why. They only have maybe 8-10 grades that they lump everything into, while I have about 50 different grades and sub-grades. I can't stress the fact enough to my sellers and potential sellers that while yes, pricing is important, GRADING is the key to getting paid fairly on converters.

I don't really worry about my competitors knowing my prices, because they won't compete with me on grading. Getting some sellers to realize the importance of proper grading is sometimes a challenge. $50 for an Import Pre-cat sounds great when the other guy is paying $30, so they never even realize that "Import Pre" was actually a $90 Small Import, and that they have been had!

My local scrap yard has their prices posted on a big board for everyone to see as soon as they get there, but I have never known them to put out a paper price list. As BL mentioned, with the market fluctuations, I can understand why they might not want to do so. Sellers ALWAYS notice when the price of anything drops the slightest bit, and some sellers can be less understanding and more difficult than others. These types of guys with a two-week-old price list in hand could be a potential headache when prices drop.

I cared more for grading purposes, but they declined that too. they said they could tell me what materials they accept, but that was the long and short of it.

I specifically asked on aluminum, but the lady on the phone just told me that they take it (go figure) and that she didn't know what grades there were.

I thought it was kind of strange.

I like working with the guys out back, they have been very nice and typically help sort. I just find it strange that they didn't break out extruded from sheet, and dumped it all into the same bin

Originally Posted by lousypirate

they didn't break out extruded from sheet, and dumped it all into the same bin

Call the yard and ask prices for extruded, and for sheet. If they give you different prices you'll know next time not to let the scale put it all together