I want to add ‘the other side’ to it a mechanical engineer. As a mechanical engineer I design a machine which consists of several parts. Most of the parts are general parts, others are specific to that machine and I am specifying the different details of that part. Most of the time this is a 2D-drawing with dimensions combined with a 3D-model. A specific part can be:
- CNC produced part from one piece of raw material. No need for coating etc. This part have only one workcenter and can be shipped afterwards
- An assembly of multiple parts welded together into one piece. Most of the time a coating is needed to protect the part. This needs several steps to produce like:
- cutting material
- prepare for welding
- welding
- stress relieving
- CNC-machining
- painting / powder coating
As an end user I want that part and I don’t care how it it produced as long as it complies with my specifications.
So the supplier gets a set of requirements and have to create a sale price. But it’s not the sales person who calculates the base price. That will be there engineer who understands the part and the processes and have experience in manufacturing. The sales person gets the base price and then decide to give a positive or negative discount. If you are a bad customer or they have way to much work, you will get a high price.
IMO it’s way easier to do the calculation in a spreadsheet and add that to the sale line including the request for quotation. I would not do this in Tryton only use it as the documentation of earlier orders. It’s more like sale_opportunity.
It’s maybe bad practice, but in the above situation, I would create a general product with all the necessary details needed for the accountant, the rest is left empty. As most products are one-offs and never come back or they do but are changed. You don’t want to waste your time with creating a new product. Let alone think about naming products.