Margins in construction materials are razor-thin. So to become profitable, producers often chase big jobs or higher volumes that look impressive at first glance but quietly drain profitability once hidden costs surface.
The real difference between winning and struggling plants comes down to tracking the right sales metrics. And those are not just limited to volume or revenue.
In this blog, we’ll break down the five sales KPIs that matter most for producers, why they’re essential, and how, without the right visibility, producers take on unprofitable work, tie up fleets, and strain relationships with their most loyal customers.
Why do the right sales metrics matter for construction material producers?
Most producers still track sales the old way: spreadsheets, gut feel, or siloed systems. It’s common to see managers pulling last month’s totals from Excel, or sales teams working off outdated price sheets.
With this approach, volume and revenue end up dominating the conversation around sales. But these numbers don’t always reflect profitability.
For example, a spike in volume may look like growth, but if trucking costs and overtime wages rise alongside it, the margins collapse. Or revenue from one flashy project may mask the fact that smaller, loyal contractors have started buying from competitors.
We recently conducted a webinar to address these issues, and one of our webinar guests, Brendan Clemente at Bonded Concrete, put it:
“Volume’s a double-edged sword… If you chase larger volume jobs, you may not take care of your base customers. And when it’s over, they may not be your customers anymore.”
[You can check out the full webinar here]
In the construction material industry, the goal isn’t just more yards, but profitable yards. And sales metrics act like early warning signals. They reveal when a contract is bleeding margin, when your fleet is stretched beyond capacity, or when everyday customers are being pushed aside.
But which metrics should you track? Let’s look at the top 5 sales metrics every producer should prioritize.
Metric #1: Good vs. bad volume
Not all volume is equal. Chasing a 100,000-yard job at razor-thin margins might keep trucks busy for a season, but it can destroy profitability and weaken customer loyalty.
What producers often overlook is that big jobs come with hidden costs: extra trucks, overtime labor, stressed plants, and the opportunity cost of sidelining steady customers. On the other side, base contractors ordering predictable loads week after week may not look flashy, but they keep cash flow steady and margins healthier.
“Good volume is stuff that’s within range of your plants, easily serviceable, not adding stress to your production team” – Brendan Clemente
To make sure you’re taking on the right projects, you should track yards sold along with:
- Plant utilization: Are big jobs tying up batching capacity?
- Fleet strain: How many extra hours and miles are required?
- Impact on loyal customers: Are base customers being delayed or ignored?
When tracked correctly, volume becomes a quality metric that shows whether your plant and fleet are being used efficiently and whether customer relationships are being strengthened over time. It highlights whether you’re building a durable, profitable business or stretching yourself thin for short-term gains.
And that leads us into the next essential number: selling price.
Metric #2: Average selling price
High ticket prices don’t always mean high profit. A three-yard COD delivery may command $200/yard but tie up a truck for hours, eroding efficiency and margin.
The average selling price needs context because different job types, customer segments, and load sizes carry different values. Without breaking ASP down by these categories, producers risk being misled by averages that look healthy but hide inefficiencies or margin erosion.
In the webinar, we highlighted why focusing only on the highest rates can be misleading:
“You can go grab three-yard, four-yard deliveries and they look really good, but that’s a truck tied up for two and a half hours… You want to sell full loads and you want to sell value in anything you’re looking for.”
By tracking ASP by segment: CODs, base contractors, specialty projects, producers can identify which customers deliver repeatable profitability and which ones quietly eat into margins.
And that leads to the metric that really tells the truth: margin.
Metric #3: Margin per yard (or per ton)
Margin is the ultimate number. Revenue means little if profitability disappears under the weight of trucking costs, overhead, and long pour times.
Yet many producers only calculate margin over materials, leaving out delivery and fixed costs. This incomplete picture can make a job look profitable when, in reality, the additional hours on the road, fuel surcharges, and overtime labor can impact your margins.
For example, a $50,000 project might seem healthy on paper, but after accounting for trucking wear-and-tear, idle time, and plant overhead, it could be a net loss.
That’s why tracking margin per yard enforces discipline. It enables producers to see whether jobs are truly profitable, not just impressive on paper. It also creates consistency across sales teams. Because every rep ends up with the same cost basis rather than their own assumptions.
And with systems like Slabstack, producers can easily set margin floors and guardrails so no quote slips through below target thresholds, removing the risk of undercutting or miscalculating costs. But we’ll discuss more about this later in the blog.
Metric #4: Segmentation of customers
Every customer is different, and the right segmentation can help you track your profits effectively.
- CODs may bring cash flow, but they’re often inefficient because they tie up trucks for small, time-consuming deliveries.
- Loyal contractors provide a steady base volume, giving plants predictable demand and repeat business that keeps operations stable.
- Specialty projects, meanwhile, can offer higher margins when producers contribute additional QC expertise or technical value, but they require careful pricing and resource planning.
By segmenting customers by load size, frequency, margin contribution, and loyalty, you can see which groups deserve priority. You can also use this segmentation to prioritize time and to balance short-term revenue with long-term profitability.
Metric #5: Quote-to-order ratio (win rate)
Quotes are leading indicators of demand. Tracking how many turn into orders provides foresight into plant utilization, fleet scheduling, and cash flow.
A low conversion rate may signal that sales teams are quoting jobs outside the company’s sweet spot, or that competitors are consistently undercutting on certain mixes or regions. A high win rate, on the other hand, shows strong alignment between pricing, service, and customer expectations.
More importantly, win/loss analysis reveals patterns that are easy to miss when you’re only focused on total revenue.
You can see whether CODs are consistently lost on price, whether large contractors are slipping away due to service issues, or whether certain plants are facing heavier competition in specific geographies.
By measuring win rates by customer type, region, and job size, producers gain an early-warning system and a roadmap for refining pricing, service strategies, and even fleet planning. The insight allows them to adjust before problems show up in the P&L.
But measuring all 5 metrics we’ve listed here, and using them to forecast demand, takes more than just relying on spreadsheets. Read on to know more.
How to track the right construction sales data?
Alot of producers fail to track these crucial sales metrics because they rely on manual systems like spreadsheets. And spreadsheets are static, error-prone, and disconnected.
In the construction industry, costs of materials like diesel, cement and additives shift daily and spreadsheets simply can’t keep up. By the time someone updates a formula, real-world costs may already have changed again. Reps often undercut each other without realizing it, managers spend hours chasing approvals, and quotes go out with outdated assumptions
That’s where a purpose-built vertical CRM for producers helps:
- It gives producers the visibility and control they need. With live cost feeds and dynamic pricing, quotes always reflect the latest material and trucking costs.
- Margin floors and approval workflows prevent loss-making jobs from slipping through.
- Dispatch integration ensures quotes connect seamlessly to scheduling, so trucks and plants aren’t overextended.
- Forecasting dashboards turn quoting activity into an early demand signal, helping producers plan capacity and resources with confidence.
Slabstack, the #1 sales and business management platform for concrete, aggregates, and asphalt producer, was built to keep these features in mind.
How Slabstack helps producers track the right metrics?
Slabstack is purpose-built for concrete and construction material suppliers. It equips producers with tools to track and act on the five metrics that matter most:
- Dynamic pricing: Live cost feeds keep quotes aligned with real costs, protecting margins.
- Margin guardrails: Automatic floors ensure no quote goes below profit targets.
- Forecasting dashboards: Quotes turn into demand signals, helping producers plan plant and fleet capacity.
- Dispatch integration: Seamless connection with systems like Sysdyne and Command Alkon pushes accepted quotes directly into dispatch. It eliminates the need for reps to manually re‑enter orders into dispatch and reduces the risk of errors or delays
- Ease of use: Sales teams adopt quickly, replacing spreadsheets with a platform designed for their industry.
With these features, producers no longer have to chase volume blindly. They can build discipline into every quote, protect margins, and prioritize the work that makes their business stronger.
As discussed in our webinar, success for producers won’t come from chasing every yard poured. It will come from tracking the right sales metrics, enforcing margin discipline, and balancing customer mix with foresight.
As Brendan Clemente put it best:
“You’ve gotta make a margin. You’ve gotta make money. Otherwise, you can put your money in a lot smarter places than the ready-mix business.”
Slabstack helps producers build that discipline into every part of the sales process. From live cost feeds to dispatch integration, our CRM ensures your team is working with real numbers, protecting profitability, and serving customers more consistently.
If you’re ready to put these metrics into action, schedule a demo with our team and see how Slabstack can help you protect margins and grow profitably.