Markup vs margin calculator for fit-out estimators

Markup and margin are not the same number. That sounds obvious until a quote is moving quickly and someone says, "Add 25% margin," while the spreadsheet is actually applying a 25% markup.

For fit-out work, that difference can quietly move the profit on every partition, ceiling, finish, and carpentry item.

The two formulas

Markup compares profit to cost:

markup = (sell - cost) / cost

Margin compares profit to sell:

margin = (sell - cost) / sell

The denominator changes the result.

Simple example

If cost is 100 and markup is 30%, sell becomes 130.

Profit is 30.

Margin is 30 / 130, which is about 23.1%.

So a 30% markup does not give a 30% margin. It gives a 23.1% margin.

Why estimators should see margin while pricing

The mistake usually happens because margin is checked after the quote is already built. By then, the estimator has to go back through rows, rates, exclusions, and rounded quantities.

Quotiqa keeps cost, markup, sell, and margin beside the measured quote item so pricing decisions stay visible where they happen.

That matters because a quote row is more than a number. It is a measured quantity, a rate assumption, a margin decision, and eventually a client-facing line item.

What to review before export

Before sending a quote, check:

• Rows with zero sell rates.
• Rows with unusual sell rates compared with your baseline.
• Rows with low margin.
• Rounded quantities that moved materially from measured quantities.
• Exclusions, GST, validity, and revision notes.

The calculator is simple. The habit is the important part: do the margin review before the client sees the PDF.

For the longer explanation, read markup vs margin: the math estimators get wrong, or inspect pricing inside the sample project.