Profit

[ukracer]

There's never 100% Profit in my opinion TBH.
There's always a cost either financial, time,transportation or commissions .
Let's say we make an example really quick .
I've got an object for free .
Where I was surely not home ,so the fuel and the time to purchase the item it's already a cost.
I found something ,take it home , clean-up and put on selling.
How much I've spent
Transportation
Clean up even if with a wet rag
Put on eBay , we have to pay a commission
The time spent in those operations.
Storage time as a cost even if laying on your kitchen floor ,it has a cost cause it's taking you space for something else.
Anyways you'll never get 100% profit
NEVER

This is why i hate these auction programs on TV. They don't take transport, VAT or selling tax when they work out how much "profit " they have made.

 

[m_c]

If you truly have zero costs, then this is the correct answer,

Infinity % profit

as anything divided by zero is infinity.
However, what people often class as 100% profit, means they get to keep 100% off the money.

So depending on your view, if you have zero costs, profit could be infinity, or 100%.

 

[Stupoty]

True if there is no cost but that is never the case.

Bob

I was asking chat gpt about this homeless guy and trying to get it to suggest charities he might be able to work for.

I mentioned that he powers his shack from free energy , it's the most enthusiastic I've ever seen it to get , started telling me free energy didn't exist and all this , so I pointed out that he finds cables in the ground with electricity in them and wires them up to his shack and he didn't have to pay , so he was getting free energy. Changed it's tune on him being a vulnerable homeless person and started saying "it's not free energy , he's just steeling it!". Still free though ?

Stu

 

[premmington]

Not sure how you plug that into the equation.

You gotta - if you wanna run a bussiness and make it work - you gotta work out the margins/costs - it gotta pay.

Odd thing is - the jobs you think you gonna earn out of and the ones you really do earn out of - until it hits a speadsheet - you can get confused.

Honestly - "all that glitters is not gold!"

 

[beeRS]

100% gross profit.
Infinity% mark up.
Nett profit is dependent on many factors and the only thing that really matters.

 

[premmington]

100% gross profit.
Infinity% mark up.
Nett profit is dependent on many factors and the only thing that really matters.

Takings are vanity - the top line - profit is sanity - the bottom line....

 

[redlig]

Just had a thought .If I leave out the maths and just think that ALL the money taken was profit then that would equate to 100% . Bloody maths ! no wonder they don't teach it in schools if they don't have too.

 

[zzr1200]

This is not a trick question but as someone who has never been in business I am in discussion with a mate and would like to know the following, If I sell something that has cost me absolutely NOTHING how much PROFIT ( as a percentage ) have I made ?

If you sell an item for £1.00 and it cost you 0.50p to make, its a 100% profit.

If you sell an item for £1.00 and it cost you nothing, then in my mind, it's an un-declared bonus..............

 

[skotl]

If you sell an item for £1.00 and it cost you 0.50p to make, its a 100% profit...

I see where you're coming from and it does indeed totally depend on the starting point, which is either cost or sale price.
So you're saying that a 50p widget that I sell for £1 is a 100% profit, but I would come at it from the other direction:

It's a 100% mark-up but as suggested above, profit is revenue minus cost, so it's 50% profit. To get back to the OP's question:

If he had bought a widget for 1p and sold it for £1 then I would view that as 99% profit, assuming no other costs. As he got it for zero pence, then the profit is 100%.

Profit should be based on revenue / sale, markup is based on purchase cost (infinity in the OP's scenario).

 

[zzr1200]

This is why i hate these auction programs on TV. They don't take transport, VAT or selling tax when they work out how much "profit " they have made.

Arr, but mostly the programs do generally "State Profit After Costs/Expenses" (Yorkshire Auction House), however Antiques Roadshow mentions them but never includes them in the figures at the bottom of the screen......,

but generally in these types of cases, is it "Profit" or is it just someone's stupid enough to pay well over the odds for someone's else's Rubbish....., only the buyer can decide...

 

[MattF]

If he had bought a widget for 1p and sold it for £1 then I would view that as 99% profit, assuming no other costs.

Your time is a cost.

 

[redlig]

Your time is a cost.

Not if I wasn't going to use that time making money.

 

[MattF]

Not if I wasn't going to use that time making money.

You have to pay yourself a wage.

 

[ajlelectronics]

Not if I wasn't going to use that time making money.

But you would be using that time for something else, even sitting there contemplating your navel, so it HAS to have a cost.

 

[Robotstar5]

.....You can have more than 100% profit. If your profit is more than double what you paid for the item then it’s greater than 100%.

Our old maths teacher would argue that point he was fond of stating percent was a fraction of 100 so you could never have more than 100%, he always comes to mind when I see or read 150% etc statements.

 

[ajlelectronics]

Our old maths teacher would argue that point he was fond of stating percent was a fraction of 100 so you could never have more than 100%, he always comes to mind when I see or read 150% etc statements.

He would be correct. 100% is the largest amount possible because, well it is 100%!

 

[Windy Miller]

100% of the money he received is profit. But he didn’t MAKE a 100% profit. The percentage profit can’t really be calculated

 

[skotl]

You have to pay yourself a wage.

…which could come out of gross profit, making net profit

 

[Burdekin]

Our old maths teacher would argue that point he was fond of stating percent was a fraction of 100 so you could never have more than 100%, he always comes to mind when I see or read 150% etc statements.

You’re misunderstanding what you were taught. There is a percentage of something you have which can’t be greater than 100% (cut a Apple in half you have two pieces that are 50% each) but if you add to that (2 apples for example) then obviously it is now greater than than the starting point and therefore greater than 100%. If you buy something for £1 and sell for £2 that’s 100% profit. If you sold it for £10 then you’re saying that still can be only 100%?

 

[Burdekin]

He would be correct. 100% is the largest amount possible because, well it is 100%!

It’s infinite.