AI quoting ROI calculator

What could faster quotes mean for revenue?

When customers compare suppliers, a late quote can arrive after they have made their choice. In a McKinsey example of an industrial OEM, the company identified slow quoting as a reason for low quote-to-sale conversion. After addressing the problem, it improved conversion by more than 10%.

We use a 10% relative lift as a planning scenario. With an assumed starting win rate of 25%, that means 27.5% after improvement—not 35%. At 500 quotes a month, the difference is an average of 12.5 additional orders. At $5,000 per order, that represents $750,000 in additional annual revenue.

The McKinsey example concerns industrial quoting, rather than formal tenders with fixed submission deadlines. It does not establish a universal response-time threshold. For your business case, compare win rates for similar requests and customers before and after improving turnaround, and confirm that production can fulfill the extra work.

What could your team do with that time?

If your team spends less time gathering information and preparing quotes, it can respond to requests that currently wait in the inbox. You could also use that time for customer follow-up or to handle more business before hiring another estimator.

With 500 quotes a month at 30 minutes each, your team spends 250 hours on preparation. Our assumed 70% reduction returns 175 hours a month. At $60 an hour, that is $126,000 of staff time over a year.

We use a staff-cost assumption that includes benefits as well as wages, following the distinction in employee compensation costs. The $60 rate is a planning assumption, not a published industry average.

How Bourne takes on the preparation

An agent reads the customer request, gathers the connected records and prepares the quote. Your rep reviews the draft and the decisions that need approval. The application brings line items and source documents together, with an assistant available for questions.

For repeat business, customer quote history helps identify the request. Current agreements still govern the commercial terms. If engineering needs to resolve a specification, we can include that clarification in the same workflow.

You can start with quoting, then extend Bourne’s manufacturing applications into order review and delivery. We build the workflow around your systems with your team.

From an estimate to your business case

The calculator gives you a starting point without asking you to design the deployment first. We use fixed assumptions for time reduction, staff cost and conversion. Your inputs describe the work you handle today and the value of the orders you win.

During scoping, we use your actual requests to work out where AI can take over preparation. We then compare the value of the recovered capacity with the implementation and running costs. How you use those hours determines the financial return.

The capacity figure concerns quoting work: more output in the same preparation hours. It follows the output-per-hour measure of productivity. The revenue scenario uses your existing quote volume, so it does not count an additional increase in the number of requests you handle.

In a manufacturing business, faster preparation can also expose a different bottleneck. The Lean Enterprise Institute distinguishes processing time from total lead time. If a rep spends 30 minutes on a quote that waits three days for engineering, the calculator estimates capacity from those 30 minutes. It does not assume the engineering queue disappears.

That distinction helps choose the first deployment. For a backlog of straightforward repeat parts, focus on preparing more quotes in the same hours. For configured equipment waiting on technical decisions, include the clarification and approval workflow in the project. We can scope Bourne around either problem and measure the result against the work your team actually needs to improve.

Frequently asked questions

What assumptions does the AI quoting calculator use?

It assumes 70% less quote-preparation time, staff costs of $60 an hour and 12 months of operation. For revenue, it assumes a 25% starting win rate and a 10% relative conversion lift, taking the rate to 27.5%. You enter quote volume, preparation time and average order value.

Is the revenue estimate additional profit?

No. It estimates additional sales before the cost of fulfilling those orders. The separate staff-time figure values capacity your team could recover. Neither figure deducts implementation or usage costs, so we do not add them together or present them as net profit.

Where does the conversion improvement come from?

McKinsey reported more than 10% conversion improvement at an industrial OEM after it addressed slow quoting. We model a 10% relative improvement as a scenario, not a guaranteed result. The 25% starting win rate is a separate planning assumption.

Do I need to know our implementation cost?

No. Start with your current quoting workload. We scope the deployment and its cost after discussing the work you want Bourne to take on.

What does 3.3 times the quoting capacity mean?

With 70% less preparation time, each quote takes 30% of the original effort. In the same quoting hours, the team could therefore handle about 3.3 times as many requests. That assumes comparable requests and enough demand to use the capacity.