Thousands of pounds of scrap wire is available...just need to know how to get my cut!

Alright. I had a great idea a few days ago. Been mulling it over and finally decided to ask yall. I've gotten my dads ideas, but theirs some things he just dont know lol.

So i do alot of work with a very large company that will remain nameless. We'll call them FRANK. (I'm insane, leave me alone)

Well, frank gives me a bunch of e-scrap every week. Frank also cuts the cords off of the e-scrap that i get, and all other e-scrap that i dont get. It's then put into a LARGE (believe it's 8x5 ft) metal bucket. The scrap yard comes to pick it up, and gives them .25 cents a pound. They include all wire in this bucket, and they NEVER snip any ends off whatsoever. If it's wire of any kind, it goes in the bucket.

Frank has many locations where i live. 4 i believe. We have a pretty good working relationship, i've worked hard to make friends with everyone that i meet.

What i want to propose to Frank, is that if you give me all your wire, i will cut all the ends off, clean it all up, separate it into the different categories, sell it, and i will get 10% of the payout. I figured, if they're only getting .25 cents a pound, on lets say what, 800 pounds? of wire, that's not a whole lot of money. But separated, and cleaned, i can bump that .25 a pound, up to anywhere between $1-1.50 a pound.

I will give Frank back all ends that i snip, so they can include them in their metal buckets.

Pops had the idea of buying outright all of Franks wire from them, at .30 cents a pound. Doing that, id have to have money upfront. I simply don't have that kind of cash rollin' around.

People of the wonderful scrap metal forum, how would YOU go about talking to Frank, and explaining this too him? And does 10% sound fair to you?

Any input is appreciated! ;)

Buying it outright is going to be your best deal by far. Call in help if you need to on the first load.

See if Frank will sell you 200# or so at $.30/lb ($60).

Take the next day and sort, strip, and sell that 200# (minimum of $200 where I'm from)

Go back to Frank later that day to purchase an additional 400# @ $.30/lb ($120)

By next week you should have enough for a 1000# purchase plus money in your pocket :)

LOL joe "call in help" eh? Lookin' for a little slice of Franks pie are we? Just kidding! :)

Hm. Buying outright eh. IF i was going to do that with ya Joe, call in help, would you be willing to buy half of however much they had, say, 800 pounds, at .30 cents a pound? All hypothetical, of course. ;)

I've got enough Franks. Call me if you want to do that.

If I were nearby I would gladly get involved. I am not. I am looking to start buying wire from my salvage yard as soon as I get equiped. I also agree buy it outright is the way to go. No chance anyone can say you shorted them on the percentage. Its a lot cleaner deal. Please let me known if "Frank" has a location near me. Mike.

THIS is what is so great about this forum. :) :) :) :)

Great advice Hoss. I hope this works out to be very profitable for you.

if it were me i would definitely buy the wire outright because as mentioned above all it takes is one bad day that they think you shorted them and the whole deal goes down the tube, it sucks i have been there, and since you already have a deal with them on escrap you dont want one "bad" deal with the wire to cost you your escrap too.

i would do whatever i could to get the funds to buy it outright, like one of the other replies said if you can't buy the whole load the first go around see if you can work with them and buy a little chunk at a time.

just my .02

Seems to me that would be a lot of work for only 10% of Franks pie, I agree, beg borrow or steal(just kidding) the money and start buying it outright. I think you'd be better off. There might be someone on here that might go half/half on this project with you to get it started. And I know your just getting da*ned tired of tearing down tv's.

I agree with M688...your selling yourself short at 10%. Best to figure out a way to buy outright like mentioned above, my guess is the guy paying .25 will go higher then .30 if challenged by your bid.

Well hell, looks like i'm just ganna buy er out right.................some how.

And yeah mech, i'm completely over tearin' down tv's. You dont even know.

Quote:

---

Well hell, looks like i'm just ganna buy er out right.................some how.
And yeah mech, i'm completely over tearin' down tv's. You dont even know.

---

Yep, I do, but if someone is willing to help you out on the first or second go-around, to be able to buy it outright then I think that would be the better way to go.

I would have to agree with everyone else, buy it outright. Even if you have to get a short term loan from a relative. Just think, with a load like that, after processing you can easily pay back what you borrowed, and then have working capital for the next loads. All it is going to take is getting the capital for that first load.

Definately buy it outright. Just a thought, but how well do you know the business? Would it be possible to negotiate a deal where for the first load only where you pay more for the wire than normal? Hear me out!

Negotiate this deal, and offer to pay a little bit more for the first load as a 'thank you' for the contract. For the first load, however, the deal would be to pick up the load on Friday, and pay them on Monday. I'm not sure if you can do that in the US, but in the UK if the contractor is known to be trustworthy they can pick up a load, take it to their yard, weigh it, grade it then pay out the customer. Thar can easily take a day or two.

Could you negotiate the same deal (even if only for the first load)? Get there real early on Friday, haul it away, and work Friday, Saturday and Sunday non-stop until you had enough bare bright to cover their payout. Take it to the yard on Monday, sell it, and use the cash to pay out the business. You've then got the rest of Monday to Friday morning to strip the remaining wire and weigh it in first thing Friday, which would give you enough money (hopefully) to buy the next load at the normal price.

I don't know your quantities and prices, but you get my drift. Do they trust you enough to give you a weekend's grace for a slightly higher return?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by TheHoss

Alright. I had a great idea a few days ago. Been mulling it over and finally decided to ask yall. I've gotten my dads ideas, but theirs some things he just dont know lol.

So i do alot of work with a very large company that will remain nameless. We'll call them FRANK. (I'm insane, leave me alone)

Well, frank gives me a bunch of e-scrap every week. Frank also cuts the cords off of the e-scrap that i get, and all other e-scrap that i dont get. It's then put into a LARGE (believe it's 8x5 ft) metal bucket. The scrap yard comes to pick it up, and gives them .25 cents a pound. They include all wire in this bucket, and they NEVER snip any ends off whatsoever. If it's wire of any kind, it goes in the bucket.

Frank has many locations where i live. 4 i believe. We have a pretty good working relationship, i've worked hard to make friends with everyone that i meet.

What i want to propose to Frank, is that if you give me all your wire, i will cut all the ends off, clean it all up, separate it into the different categories, sell it, and i will get 10% of the payout. I figured, if they're only getting .25 cents a pound, on lets say what, 800 pounds? of wire, that's not a whole lot of money. But separated, and cleaned, i can bump that .25 a pound, up to anywhere between $1-1.50 a pound.

I will give Frank back all ends that i snip, so they can include them in their metal buckets.

Pops had the idea of buying outright all of Franks wire from them, at .30 cents a pound. Doing that, id have to have money upfront. I simply don't have that kind of cash rollin' around.

People of the wonderful scrap metal forum, how would YOU go about talking to Frank, and explaining this too him? And does 10% sound fair to you?

Any input is appreciated! ;)

---

If you take the wire on consignment, upon sale give "Frank" a copy of the weigh slip along with his cut. Franks cut should only be a maximum of 20-25%.

Find out what all the yards near you pay per pound. Then either offer 50 to 65% of that to them.

this happyscraper here, and i am confused about something. if this wire from frank is cords that are binig cut off and if you don't strip it than why do you cut the plugs off? the scrap yards i go to want the plugs left on plus your loseing wieght.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by happyscraper

this happyscraper here, and i am confused about something. if this wire from frank is cords that are binig cut off and if you don't strip it than why do you cut the plugs off? the scrap yards i go to want the plugs left on plus your loseing wieght.

---

Many yards will pay less if the end is on because of the extra weight. It's a good practice to know why a yard wants something a certain way because sometimes it benefits them and pays you less, other times it's better for you.

Here is the problem as I see it. EScrap wire is not a lot of recovery. You are looking at 20-30% at best. You need to buy it outright if you do the deal at all. Percentages always bite you and why risk your other business with him if this goes south? Consignment might work but its hard to get someone who is getting cash now to wait. I believe Whimpy said it best, " I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today"

If you try to buy a small amount of 100 pounds at .25 per pound you spend $25. Now assume you get 20% recovery that will be 20 pounds. This wire tends to be #2 in many places so assume about $3.25 per pound. You will have $65 after you sell. This is a gross profit of $40.

Now how long to strip it and is this time worth $40 to you. If so then go this route and buy more with your profits.

Thanks for the explanation of the actual numbers. Its great a guy who deals with the REAL percentages to weigh in. Mike.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KZBell

Many yards will pay less if the end is on because of the extra weight. It's a good practice to know why a yard wants something a certain way because sometimes it benefits them and pays you less, other times it's better for you.

---

Yep! yards by me take them with the ends on. I pull off the brass and make sure there is no steel on the ends that are left. They take phone wire as well as ribbon wire as #2 insulated. So no #3 catergory by me!

We buy a ton of wire, and I honestly think the worst thing in the world is separating it. When you have a full gaylord of wire, and it is all mixed up and all the wires are entangled, it is the absolute worst. The below pic represents nearly 10000 lbs of insulated wire that we bought. We started separating wire because there were some good thick stuff in there that we were going to personally strip, but it was just not worth the time separating it. 1 box took close to 1+hours with three people working on it. I would suggest going to Frank and telling them how to properly and easily separate this wire. That is what we did with our suppliers. They made more money, and we made more money. People like when you take time to teach them and maximize their profits. Win win.

http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/5143/wireny.jpg
http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/411/wire2l.jpg

Ide be clipping all them gold ends for sure.

Quote:

---

Ide be clipping all them gold ends for sure.

---

Yea, you'd look like Captain Kangaroo with all those ends in your pockets,,
http://www.tvparty.com/bgifs9/cap-clock.jpg

All the ends can be sold for more than scrap steel.

Oh, Trust me gold ends get clipped. But you can tackle a box in 30 minutes with 3 people on it if it is just wires with gold ends. If you have to sort and cut, that is when you run into some major problems.

http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/721/goldends.jpg
http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/3020/goldends2.jpg

I'm talking about the other cord ends that plug into the wall. There is a market for them as well.

I have a barrell of the ends that plug into the wall. I would love to find a market for them!

We leave those on the wires. Do your yards not take the wire with the ends on them or something.

They dock me a grade if I leave the ends on, mostly on the 220v cords.

I am getting a up-to-date pricing on them but shipped to our door is around 15 or so cents a pound. But don't do shipping until we have a good price on them.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by freonjoe

They dock me a grade if I leave the ends on, mostly on the 220v cords.

---

Got ya, what is the price with the ends on.

They drop me down to a buck a pound.