Structured cabling / low-voltage contractors
First call. Cable Pro is the package.
Internal plan · Enlighten Studios · Mike Cobus
Enlighten product line
Lantern is a shop tool. Mapping is the business.
This is not a raise. It is how Enlighten Studios in Waukesha, Wisconsin sells a field map to cabling shops we can drive to. Software is a meter. The walk is the invoice people understand.
20
of 25
Launch deadline
Charge the walk · Friday, October 30, 2026
Plant import, company price book, invoice PDF, first real building. Then a check. No Stripe. 20 of 25 gates closed. Next: Plant CSV import — before charge day.
Until charge day
Friday, October 30, 2026
45
Days
22
Hours
48
Min
16
Sec
Problem
Three systems, one closet
The tech is standing in the IDF with a phone. The cert is in LinkWare. The invoice is a spreadsheet that does not match the PO. Jobber knows the appointment. ConnectWise knows the ticket. Nobody has the jack, the switch port, the IP phone on that drop, and the bill in one place. That is the hole. We do not compete with the tools that already won the other rooms.
Who buys
Contractors first
MSP with a cabling sideline
Second. Start MSP Basic; flip Cable Pro when they bill the pull.
Facility / campus IT
Later. They want the map. They are not the first check.
First calls: Kelley Communications, RD Technology, Edge Electric, Kohl, Terminal-Andrae.
Offer
Cable Pro at $99 + $35
One published price. Office $99/mo (1 admin, 1 building). Field seat $35/mo. Extra building $30/mo. Plant import typically $3,500 (band $1,500–$8,000 by closet count). A six-person shop is $274/mo, $3,288/yr, plus the walk.
Bill 1 · Enlighten → shop
Lantern seats
You pay Enlighten Studios for the office, field seats, and extra buildings. QuickBooks or a check — the way you already pay us. If the invoice ages out, we freeze the tenant. The plant file is still yours.
Bill 2 · Shop → your customer
The job invoice
You bill the building owner from the work order. PO, footage, cert, Net 30. That AR is yours. Enlighten does not take a cut and does not sit on that payment.
Economics
1–5 shops vs 20–40
1–5 shops
A tool for Enlighten and neighbors
Five Cable Pro shops at the six-person example is $1,370/mo software — $16,440/yr. Year-one imports on five buildings at the typical fee add $17,500. Hosting is the VM we already run. Time is Mike plus the agents. This band pays for the product existing. It is not a company.
20–40 shops
A Midwest line item
Thirty shops at the same mix is $8,220/mo, about $98,640/yr on seats, plus mapping whenever a building is new. That is a real line on Enlighten’s books. Do not staff a hunter for it. Do not count forty shops as a plan until five have paid.
Margin honesty: the subscription is cheap on purpose. Import is where the cash shows up in year one. If a walk blows past the quote because the drawings were fiction, we lost money on that job — requote, don’t eat it. We do not take a cut of shop AR, so we never confuse their revenue with ours.
How Enlighten gets paid
QuickBooks. Check. Freeze.
- + Seats invoiced from QuickBooks, Net 15, the way shops already pay Enlighten.
- + Import: 50% to book the walk, remainder when the plant is live in their tenant.
- + If seats age out: freeze in Admin. Plant file stays. Logins do not.
- + Stripe is optional later, after a shop has paid by check and asked for a card.
- − Never deposit the shop’s customer job check.
What we will not build
Stay in the hole
- − A D-Tools or Accubid competitor (estimating, takeoff, bid packages)
- − A ConnectWise / PSA replacement (helpdesk tickets, agreements, time sheets)
- − A QuickBooks replacement (payroll, books, tax)
- − Fluke LinkWare or a tester API — we store the PDF they already export
- − iTRACS / DCIM for data centers
- − Live LDAP bind or switch scrapes as a launch requirement
- − Native App Store / Play binaries until developer accounts and signing are real
- − Stripe until a shop has paid by check and asked for a card
- − Taking a cut of the shop’s accounts receivable
Risks
Say them out loud
The import is labor
Bad as-builts eat the typical fee. Quote campus and fiction drawings at the high end, or walk away.
Shops ask for D-Tools
Say no. If they need a bid package, they already have a tool. We run the job they won.
They stop paying
Freeze. Do not argue in email. The plant file is still theirs if they come back.
We confuse the two bills
Never deposit a customer’s job check. Seats are Enlighten AR. Job invoices are the shop’s AR.
1–5 shops feel like a product company
They are not. That band is a tool for us and our neighbors. 20–40 Midwest shops is a line item. Do not staff for 20 until 5 have paid.