Where framing contractors lose money
4 things cost framing contractors money without ever becoming a line item, and each one traces to a step you can install. Framing contractors average 18% gross margin, 13% overhead and 5% net profit at $1M to $5M of revenue. The CFOS target at that size is 22% gross margin, 12% overhead and 10% net, and the 5 points left on the table is where those mechanisms live. Figures for all 7 revenue bands are in the table below.
Framing ranks 8th of 8 in envelope and structure on net profit, and it has leaner overhead than the 48-trade average. Here is every figure, across all 7 revenue bands.
Run On CFOS publishes the full benchmark reference: 48 trades across all 7 revenue bands, $1M to $500M and above. The 4 bands above $25M are modeled and labeled that way in every table, and no CFOS target is published for them. Run On CFOS computes net profit as gross margin minus overhead, before taxes.
Framing by revenue band
| Metric | $1M to $5M | $5M to $10M | $10M to $25M | $25M to $50MModeled | $50M to $100MModeled | $100M to $500MModeled | $500M+Modeled | CFOS target at $1M to $5M |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overhead | 13% | 12% | 11% | 10% | 9% | 8% | 8% | 12% |
| Gross margin | 18% | 19% | 20% | 22% | 23% | 25% | 27% | 22% |
| Net profit | 5% | 7% | 9% | 12% | 14% | 17% | 19% | 10% |
| Metric | $1M to $5M | $5M to $10M | $10M to $25M |
|---|---|---|---|
| Overhead | 12% | 11% | 10% |
| Gross margin | 22% | 21.5% | 22.5% |
| Net profit | 10% | 10.5% | 12.5% |
Modeled extension of the survey curve, not reconciled against the licensed CFMA Benchmarker. That applies to the 4 bands above $10M to $25M, and no CFOS target is published for them.
Gross margin and overhead come from figures CFMA, Jones Maresca and other sources publish by trade and size. Net profit is computed, not surveyed: net profit = gross margin minus overhead. Nothing comes out for taxes, interest or other income and expense, so it is a before tax figure, on the same basis as CFMA's net income before taxes.
CFMA's 2025 medians are 7.1 percent before interest and taxes and 6.7 percent net income before taxes. Gross margin minus overhead leaves out interest and other income and expense, so a figure here can come in a little above or below a reported net income on the same business.
Above the $10M to $25M band the gross margin and overhead rows are a modeled extension of the same curves. They have not been reconciled against the licensed CFMA Benchmarker, so read those bands as a model and not as a survey result.
Run On CFOS. Run On CFOS Trade Benchmark Reference: Framing. 2026. Sulphur Prairie Operations, LLC. https://runoncfos.com/trades/framing. CC BY 4.0.
Figures on this page were last revised 2026-08-21. Published under CC BY 4.0, which permits reuse of any figure here, including commercially, as long as the credit above travels with it. The same figures in machine-readable form: /benchmarks.json.
Trade level gross margin and overhead come from figures CFMA, Jones Maresca and other sources publish, and Run On CFOS computes net profit from them: net profit = gross margin minus overhead, before taxes. The CFOS targets beside them are from the book CONTROL: C.F.O.S. Construction Financial Operating System, published with the full reference at runoncfos.com.
- 2024 Construction Financial Benchmarker, Executive Summary, Construction Financial Management Association, 2024.
- 2025 Construction Financial Benchmarker, Executive Summary, Construction Financial Management Association, 2025.
- 2025 Performance Benchmarks, Construction Companies, Jones Maresca and Company, 2025.
- Run On CFOS Trade Benchmark Reference, Sulphur Prairie Operations, LLC, 2026.
Sourcing and method: the methodology page.
Which bands are measured. The 4 bands above $10M to $25M extend the survey curve further out and have not been reconciled against the licensed CFMA Benchmarker. How every figure was built is explained on the methodology page.
Use these numbers on your own jobs
CFOS for QuickBooks grades your own books against the framing figures above, every month. At $1M to $5M, the published average net profit is 5% before taxes and the CFOS target is 10%.
Under $10M. You see which jobs made money while they are still open, so you can fix a framing job before it closes. From $10M to $50M. The controller gets a WIP that ties to QuickBooks Online, with each project manager's cost to complete approved every month.
4 problems specific to framing
You bid the plan by the square foot and pay the crew by the hour or by the unit, and nothing you own converts one into the other. You priced the plan off a March quote and you're still setting walls on that same plan in October at March money. The deck is clean, the walls are plumb and braced, and eight guys are on it waiting for a girder truss somebody else was supposed to order. The slab is an inch and a half out of square, the concrete crew is gone and paid, and covering it up just became a framing expense.
Each one below points at the item, the unit, the clock, or the party that makes it a framing problem, and it says which step fixes it.
| Mechanism | Why it's specific to this trade | Step |
|---|---|---|
| Nothing in your books turns hours back into square feet | Almost no other trade bids in one unit and buys its biggest cost in a different one. A plumber bids fixtures and buys fixtures; an electrician bids devices and buys devices. Framing bids floor area and pays labor by the clock or by the piece, so the conversion has to be built on purpose or it simply doesn't exist. | Estimating system |
| Your plan price is fixed and lumber reprices every week | Framing is the trade whose material half is a traded commodity bought load by load across dozens of repeat starts on one fixed price. Trades that buy fixtures or gear order once per job at a quoted price and take the loss once. You take the same loss twenty times on the same plan number and the contract never reopens. | Estimating system |
| Walls stack in four days. Trusses take eight weeks. | Framing is one of the few trades that gets a structure half built and then has to stop mid-sequence waiting on a made-to-order component it didn't buy. Trades that install stock material can push through in one mobilization. You stack walls in days and then hold an eight-man crew against a component with a two-month clock. | Project management |
| You inherit the slab and pay for the shim labor | Framing is where the design gets forced to match what got poured, because every trade after you sets to your lines. Drywall, mechanical, and finish trades inherit a structure that was already corrected, while you inherit the error itself and have to make it disappear. That correction work has no cost code, no change order, and no witness left on site by the time you find it. No report downstream shows the day you spent pulling the plate line straight. | Estimating system |
Framing against the other 47 trades
| Metric | Framing | Envelope and structure average | All 48 average | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overhead | 13% | 15.1% | 15.1% | 1st of 48 |
| Gross margin | 18% | 22.8% | 22.1% | 44th of 48 |
| Net profit | 5% | 7.6% | 7% | 42nd of 48 |
Framing sheds 5 points of overhead between $1M to $5M and $500M+, against 6.3 for envelope and structure as a group. Inside that group, Curtain wall and glazing, Waterproofing all keep 9%, the most in the group, and Framing has the leanest overhead at 13%. The leanest one is this trade.
Other envelope and structure trades
What owners ask
What overhead should a framing contractor have?
Framing shares its overhead figure with 4 other trades at this revenue, which is what the published data resolves to. It averages 13% at $1M to $5M and 8% at $500M+, as a percentage of revenue. That is 2.1 points below the envelope and structure average of 15.1%. The CFOS target at $1M to $5M is 12%. The CFOS target is one point leaner than your trade's industry average at your revenue.
What gross margin should a framing contractor have?
Framing shares its gross margin figure with 4 other trades at this revenue, which is what the published data resolves to. It averages 18% at $1M to $5M and 27% at $500M+, as a percentage of revenue. That is 4.8 points below the envelope and structure average of 22.8%. The CFOS target at $1M to $5M is 22%. The CFOS target recalculates at your revenue: whatever gross margin produces the net profit target once overhead is paid, never below your trade's own industry average.
What net profit should a framing contractor have?
Framing shares its net profit figure with 2 other trades at this revenue, which is what the published data resolves to. It averages 5% at $1M to $5M and 19% at $500M+, before taxes, gross margin minus overhead, as a percentage of revenue. That is 2.6 points below the envelope and structure average of 7.6%. The CFOS target at $1M to $5M is 10%. The CFOS target recalculates at your revenue: 10 percent before taxes, or 3.5 points better than your trade's industry average, whichever is higher.
What profit margin should a small framing business have?
Owners usually mean net profit when they say profit margin, and for framing at $1M to $5M that's 5%. Gross margin is a different number, 18%, and it's what's left after job costs but before overhead. Overhead is the 13% between the two. A small framing business holding 5% net is at the published figure for its size, and the CFOS target at that revenue is 10%.
Does framing get more profitable as it grows?
Overhead is the number that moves. Framing sheds 5 points between $1M to $5M and $500M+, which is flatter than the 6.3 points envelope and structure sheds as a group. Net profit starts 2 points under the 48-trade average, so the room is in the overhead line before it's anywhere else.
Where does framing rank against the other trades?
Framing is 8th of 8 in envelope and structure on net profit. Curtain wall and glazing, Waterproofing are the most profitable at 9%. It also has the leanest overhead in the group. Gross margin ranks 44th of 48 and overhead ranks 1st.
That's the industry average and the CFOS target for framing at every size. Want your own books set beside them? The Financial Health Snapshot builds a CEO Report from your last twelve months, sets every figure against your trade, and walks you through it on a 60 minute call. SPM The Construction CFO (Sulphur Prairie Management, LLC) is a separate firm, and the same author leads it.
Everything on this page is something you can install yourself, and CONTROL is the order to do it in. If you would rather buy the finished result, SPM The Construction CFO does this work for framing contractors as a service. It is a separate firm, Sulphur Prairie Management, LLC, led by the same author.
Wrote CONTROL, the 8 step system behind these figures. More about the author.