How Gridiron Steel cut a week of takeoff to 3–5 hours
Gridiron Steel's three estimators bid structural steel and miscellaneous metals across the Mid-Atlantic. Ferra cut their takeoffs from days to hours, and their senior estimator says he couldn't bid his volume without it.
The numbers, in Peyton's words
- 3–5 hrsTakeoff on a 500-ton clean section job
- 10–15 minMain framing on a 500+ ton project
- 5 secTo add 314 roof-level columns
Where the hours went
Gridiron Steel fabricates and erects structural steel and miscellaneous metals out of Pennsylvania, and bids work across the Mid-Atlantic. Three estimators carry the whole bid load.
Before Ferra, takeoffs ran through Bluebeam and Excel. Asked what hurt most in the bid process, Peyton named three things: columns, addenda and specs. A typical takeoff on a $500K project took three working days.
Three working days on a $500K project.
A 500-ton job in 3–5 hours, while setting up other bids.
- Beams, columns, joists and braces detected
- Risk score and go/no-go from Bid Intelligence
- 3D model and IFC export
- Exports to Tekla, Bluebeam or CSV
I would not be able to bid the volume of work I do without Ferra.
Quirks, and the team behind them
We asked Peyton what surprised him and what we still need to get better at. He answered both at once.
“Ferra has the best customer service team in the tech space. I have an issue, I have a link to the team to help me fix it in real time. I tell people to sign up for Ferra for this reason alone.”
“Ferra is a program that is always changing and adding new features to allow it to stay ahead of the game. It has its quirks like any new tech does, but the team support behind it makes those quirks a non-issue!”
Peyton's advice to a fabricator on the fence