Pricing of materials for craft companies

That does not apply to everyone, as I repeatedly see such craftsmen and their company vehicles in front of hardware stores;

Yes, go to a drive-in at Bauhaus or similar. Two-thirds of the vehicles are for commercial use, because the hardware store is nothing other than the wholesale store (for many trades).

Well, there is only one direction you can go.

This is very rarely the case and not here either.

As long as customers go along and craftsmen have enough orders, something can be earned. When that is no longer the case, as currently with new construction, then there is complaining and calls for help. When companies actually go bankrupt, new ones arise in a healthy economy and earn the margin.

The example with heat pumps is currently making rounds in the press. I myself cannot judge it and have already seen videos in which craftsmen precisely calculate why a heat pump with installation cannot cost less than 30,000 euros. However, I doubt that the price would be so high without the subsidy. As you say, prices are allegedly significantly lower in all other countries.

The individual parts for an iPhone (software aside) are also significantly cheaper than the entire phone – you just don’t see it on the invoice. If you can’t assemble the parts yourself, you probably have to accept the market economy, do without, or find your own way.

One repeatedly hears statements like "The craftsman gets better prices, which he partly passes on to the customers, this must be taken into account with self-performance, as private customers do not have these advantages." Now, I want to start a discussion about self-performance here and not about the pricing of craftsmen, but I cannot recall any invoice where the material even remotely had the prices I would have gotten privately. So where do statements like the above come from? Or is this again a myth that certain interest groups have spread?

In my trade, a 100 percent price markup is standard.

The prices in the price list for the end customer were always designed so that I make 100 percent profit on them.
A part costs 200 euros according to the wholesaler's price list. I bought it from the wholesaler for 100 euros.

The manufacturer sells it to the wholesaler for 50 euros. That results in prices where the end customer buys a product whose price
is very high but is not reflected in the quality of the product.

Often the customer then thinks, since they paid a lot of money for it, it must be good. Often, that remains the case.

Nevertheless, wholesale has its justification. The craftsman also stands behind the warranty. He must trust the installed products
and be able to exchange them in case of defects. This becomes difficult with purchases made on the internet.

He can only sell products where spare parts service or functioning customer support also work.

But no one gets upset when Adidas buys a pair of sneakers in China for 5 euros and sells them in the shop here for 120 euros. And this is how the majority of trade works, whether it’s a hardware store or a clothing store.

As long as it is bought, that is not a problem at all.

It is different, for example, in the photovoltaic industry. Here, you can shop privately at many small dealers, and the margins on these parts are very low. There is massive price competition there, and the entire market is fiercely contested.

In my trade, a 100 percent price markup is common.

What kind of trade? Just from the field of statistics: the profit margin in wholesale of sanitary and building components is around +/- 5%, at building material dealers about 3%. And when I look at other wholesalers, like Metro for example, the prices there are 1:1 like in any supermarket.

Keep dreaming. No one gets up anymore for a 3 percent margin in wholesale.

You’re not going to tell me that if the wholesaler buys a screw for 1 euro, they sell it to the craftsman for 1.03 euro.