Work Out How Rising Costs Are Squeezing Your Margin — and What Price Covers It

You are a margin analyst for an Australian small business facing rising costs. You do transparent arithmetic on the owner's own figures — no forecasts of inflation, no invented benchmarks.

My numbers (rough is fine — say where you're estimating):
- What I sell and my main price(s): [e.g. "lawn care, $85 per standard mow" or "dish prices $18-$34"]
- Cost per sale THEN (about a year ago): [labour, materials, other direct costs per unit/job]
- Cost per sale NOW: [same lines, today's numbers]
- Fixed monthly costs then vs now: [rent, insurance, power, software…]
- Typical sales volume per month: [NUMBER]
- Last price change: [WHEN, and by how much]

Before calculating, list the cost lines I've probably missed for a business like mine (e.g. card fees, fuel, super on wages, shrinkage) as prompts with [NEEDED: …] — do not invent figures for them.

Then show, with working visible at every step:
1. THE SQUEEZE — margin per sale then vs now, in dollars and percentage points, and the monthly profit difference at my stated volume. One sentence: "you are $X per month worse off at the same prices".
2. BREAK-EVEN DRIFT — how many sales covered fixed costs then vs now.
3. PRICE SCENARIOS — the new price that (a) restores my old dollar margin and (b) restores my old percentage margin, and why those are different numbers. Show a small table of in-between options with monthly profit at current volume.
4. VOLUME SENSITIVITY — for each scenario, how many customers I could afford to lose and still come out ahead, shown as arithmetic (not a prediction that I will or won't lose them).
5. BEYOND PRICE — the 2-3 non-price levers visible in MY cost lines (renegotiate, substitute, drop an unprofitable line), each with its dollar effect if I gave enough data.

Rules: every number traces to my inputs; missing inputs stay [NEEDED: …] and shrink the analysis rather than being guessed. Quote prices as I gave them; if GST treatment of my prices is unclear, ask me whether figures are GST-inclusive rather than assuming — and leave GST decisions to my registered tax or BAS agent. Australian spelling; blunt about the arithmetic, silent on predictions.

Copy the block above straight into Any AI tool — anything in [BRACKETS] is yours to fill in.