Estimator - Custom Exhibits and Scenic Fabrication
About The Position
The Factory NYC is a custom fabrication and production company in Brooklyn that builds and installs physical objects for clients, including museum exhibits, brand activations, luxury retail environments, public art, architectural millwork, and unique, uncategorized pieces. The primary deliverable is the completed object, installed on site by the contracted date. The company is seeking a Production Estimator to be responsible for determining the cost of building these projects. This role involves analyzing defined scopes to calculate costs for labor by trade, materials, machine time, vendors, installation, and strike, as well as incorporating risk assessment. The estimated cost forms the basis for the company's pricing. The estimator is expected to assess the feasibility of building projects as designed within available time and capacity, and to communicate any limitations early. Identifying and escalating feasibility and capacity risks are key responsibilities. The role requires reasoning about how to create unique items rather than relying on standard pricing, as most projects are novel. The Production Estimator will report to the Director of Production and learn the company's methods and cost history from the lead estimator. This is a full estimator position, not a junior role, with ownership of assigned bids.
Requirements
- Seven or more years of estimating experience in custom fabrication, scenic production, construction, or a comparable build environment.
- Real knowledge of fabrication across multiple trades, including carpentry, metalwork, finishing, assembly, and the machine side of CNC and digital fabrication.
- Understanding of fabrication methods and their associated labor hours based on direct observation.
- Ability to read drawings, models, and specifications, translate them into a buildable method, and identify unresolved design elements before costing.
- Judgment regarding capacity, department workload, and lead times, with the willingness to state when a schedule is unachievable.
- Experience costing materials and vendor scope, and holding vendors to their quoted prices.
- Comfort working within a structured production and quoting system, utilizing connected toolsets and AI tooling in the estimating workflow.
- Strong organization skills to manage multiple bids with different deadlines.
- Clear communication skills to collaborate with account management, project management, drafting, shop floor personnel, and vendors.
Nice To Haves
- Estimating experience across mixed trades within a single shop, rather than deep expertise in only one trade.
- Direct experience working on a shop floor.
- Experience building or maintaining an estimating library and reconciling it against completed jobs.
- Experience estimating installation and strike, including site conditions, access, and crew size.
- Proficiency in marking up drawings in AutoCAD, Rhino, SketchUp, or comparable software.
- Awareness of CNC and additive manufacturing sufficient to estimate machine time separately from surrounding labor.
Responsibilities
- Review drawings, specifications, and scope to identify and request clarification for undefined elements necessary for honest costing.
- Break down scopes into buildable components, detailing labor costs by trade with justification for each number.
- Determine fabrication methods, including sequencing, material selection, and deciding when to use vendors or subcontractors.
- Calculate costs for materials, machine time, vendor scope, logistics, installation, and strike.
- Assess written hours against shop capacity and escalate potential bottlenecks and schedule risks to the Director of Production.
- Present build approaches to department managers for larger jobs to ensure methods are pressure-tested before cost commitment.
- Cost change orders with the same rigor as original estimates and meet required deadlines.
- Hand over estimates to production and review them together to ensure the shop understands the intended build.
- Build and maintain the estimating library and records of completed job costs, updating them with actual production results.
- Reconcile estimated costs against actual costs for every job priced, analyze variances, and use this information to improve future estimates.
Benefits
- Percentage stipend toward medical, vision, and dental insurance.
- Paid time off.
- Savings incentive match plan for employees.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Senior
Education Level
Associate degree
