Where low voltage and AV contractors lose money
6 things cost low voltage and AV contractors money without ever becoming a line item, and each one traces to a step you can install. Low voltage and AV contractors average 24% gross margin, 16% overhead and 8% net profit at $1M–$5M of revenue. The CFOS target at that size is 26.5% gross margin, 15% overhead and 11.5% net, and the 3.5 points left on the table is where those mechanisms live. Figures for all 7 revenue bands are in the table below.
Low voltage and AV ranks 2nd of 6 in electrical and technology on net profit, and it has heavier overhead than the 48-trade average. Here is every figure, across all 7 revenue bands.
Low voltage and AV by revenue band
| Metric | $1M–$5M | $5M–$10M | $10M–$25M | $25M–$50MModeled | $50M–$100MModeled | $100M–$500MModeled | $500M+Modeled | CFOS target at $1M–$5M |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overhead | 16% | 15% | 14% | 13% | 12% | 11% | 10% | 15% |
| Gross margin | 24% | 25% | 26% | 27% | 29% | 30% | 32% | 26.5% |
| Net profit | 8% | 10% | 12% | 14% | 17% | 19% | 22% | 11.5% |
| Metric | $1M–$5M | $5M–$10M | $10M–$25M |
|---|---|---|---|
| Overhead | 15% | 14% | 13% |
| Gross margin | 26.5% | 27.5% | 28.5% |
| Net profit | 11.5% | 13.5% | 15.5% |
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 CFMA, Jones Maresca and SPM's own trade data, because those are the figures those sources report by trade and size. Net profit is calculated from them as gross margin minus overhead, so the three rows tie. That makes it an operating profit figure: what is left before interest, other income and expense, and the tax planning choices owners make, such as bonuses, depreciation methods and retirement contributions.
Surveys report net income before taxes after those items, so a reported net can run below the figure here. At the typical contractor the difference is small: CFMA's 2025 medians are 7.1 percent before interest and taxes and 6.7 percent net income before taxes. It grows with size. Against the separate measured net profit dataset, the calculated net runs 0.8 points higher at $1M to $5M, 2.2 points at $5M to $10M and 3.5 points at $10M to $25M, because the gross margin and overhead rows change faster with size than reported net profit does.
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, and the calculated net there runs well above survey medians, so read those bands as a model and not as a survey result.
Run On CFOS. Run On CFOS Trade Benchmark Reference: Low voltage and AV. 2026. Sulphur Prairie Operations, LLC. https://runoncfos.com/trades/low-voltage. 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 derives net profit as gross margin minus overhead. 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–$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.
6 problems specific to low voltage and AV
The hardware is half the contract and it buys on a net-30 line from ADI or Almo, while the GC pays 90 days later. You loaded, terminated, burned in, and tested the rack in your shop because that's the cheapest place to do it. Copper moves and comes back. Your commissioning crew is mobilized, on site, and idle, waiting on a help desk ticket.
Each one below points at the item, the unit, the clock, or the party that makes it a low voltage and AV problem, and it says which step fixes it.
| Mechanism | Why it's specific to this trade | Step |
|---|---|---|
| Your Distributor Credit Line Sets Your Revenue Ceiling | A framer buys dimensional lumber that three suppliers can fill, at maybe a fifth of contract value. Half or more of your contract is manufacturer hardware, single sourced through ADI, Almo, Exertis, Snap One, or Herman, and the credit line at that distributor is a hard number that doesn't flex with signed backlog. So the ceiling on your revenue gets set inside a credit department you've never visited. | Job cost structure |
| Shop-Built Racks Stall as WIP With No Billing Against Them | Most trades install their material in the building, so material on site and material billable end up meaning close to the same thing. AV integration pulls a large share of the labor and nearly all of the hardware value into a shop build, because racking and burning in a system inside a finished conference room costs about triple. The practice that protects your labor margin is the same practice that strands your cash. | Project management |
| You Bid a Model Number, Then It Goes End-of-Life | Trades with commodity exposure can point at a published index and write escalation language a GC will accept. Your exposure is a discontinued SKU, which no index tracks and no GC treats as a market condition. Division 27 and 28 scopes rarely include escalation at all, because the GC reads your bill of materials as a purchase order and treats it as a fixed price buy. | Estimating system |
| Commissioning Waits on the Owner's IT Department | Other trades get gated by predecessors who work off the same schedule and answer to the same superintendent. Your predecessor is a corporate IT department with its own change control window, its own security review, and zero contractual duty to the construction schedule. The GC has no leverage there, so the schedule pressure rolls downhill onto you. | Project management |
| Your Own Closeout Releases Your Month-Three Retention | Trades that finish mid-job hold retention for a few months and move on. You hold it for the full build duration, because your earliest dollar and your last deliverable fall at opposite ends of the same schedule. It's also money you already borrowed against a distributor line to fund in the first place, so you're paying for it twice. | Monthly cadence |
| Parts Are Covered. The Truck Roll Is on You. | A roofer's callback is a leak in something the roofer installed. Yours is frequently a change somebody else made to a network you don't control, on hardware whose vendor already shipped the fix. That gives this trade an entire class of unbilled labor other trades never see, and it comes due after the job is closed and the margin has already been recognized. | Overhead calculation |
Low voltage and AV against the other 47 trades
| Metric | Low voltage and AV | Electrical and technology average | All 48 average | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overhead | 16% | 15.5% | 15.1% | 32nd of 48 |
| Gross margin | 24% | 22.8% | 22.1% | 8th of 48 |
| Net profit | 8% | 7.3% | 7% | 8th of 48 |
Low voltage and AV sheds 6 points of overhead between $1M–$5M and $500M+, against 6 for electrical and technology as a group. Inside that group, Electrical is the most profitable at 9%, and Fiber, Solar and Telecom all run 15% overhead, the leanest. Low voltage and AV is neither, which is the usual position and the one with the most room in it.
Other electrical and technology trades
What owners ask
What overhead should a low voltage and AV contractor run?
Low voltage and AV shares its overhead figure with 12 other trades at this revenue, which is what the published data resolves to. It averages 16% at $1M–$5M and 10% at $500M+, as a percentage of revenue. That is 0.5 points above the electrical and technology average of 15.5%. The CFOS target at $1M–$5M is 15%. The CFOS target is one point leaner than your trade's industry average at your revenue.
What gross margin should a low voltage and AV contractor run?
Low voltage and AV shares its gross margin figure with 4 other trades at this revenue, which is what the published data resolves to. It averages 24% at $1M–$5M and 32% at $500M+, as a percentage of revenue. That is 1.2 points above the electrical and technology average of 22.8%. The CFOS target at $1M–$5M is 26.5%. 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 low voltage and AV contractor run?
Low voltage and AV shares its net profit figure with 12 other trades at this revenue, which is what the published data resolves to. It averages 8% at $1M–$5M and 22% at $500M+, before taxes, as a percentage of revenue. That is 0.7 points above the electrical and technology average of 7.3%. The CFOS target at $1M–$5M is 11.5%. 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 low voltage and AV business run?
Owners usually mean net profit when they say profit margin, and for low voltage and AV at $1M–$5M that's 8%. Gross margin is a different number, 24%, and it's what's left after job costs but before overhead. Overhead is the 16% between the two. A small low voltage and AV business holding 8% net is at the published figure for its size, and the CFOS target at that revenue is 11.5%.
Does low voltage and AV get more profitable as it grows?
Overhead is the number that moves. Low voltage and AV sheds 6 points between $1M–$5M and $500M+, which is in line with the 6 points electrical and technology sheds as a group. Net profit is already above the 48-trade average, so the room is in holding it while revenue climbs.
Where does low voltage and AV rank against the other trades?
Low voltage and AV is 2nd of 6 in electrical and technology on net profit. Electrical is the most profitable at 9%. Fiber, Solar and Telecom run the leanest overhead at 15%. Gross margin ranks 8th of 48 and overhead ranks 32nd.
That's the industry average and the CFOS target for low voltage and AV 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 runs 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 low voltage and AV contractors as a service. It is a separate firm, Sulphur Prairie Management, LLC, run by the same author.
What a fractional CFO does for low voltage and AV contractors
Wrote CONTROL, the 8 step system behind these figures. More about the author.