Canadian installers who publish a per-foot price land between CA$8.50 and CA$12 per linear foot with lights, install, takedown and storage included (Forever Party Rentals, North Vancouver), or CA$3 to CA$8 for simpler work (Shine City, Surrey). Ontario companies mostly publish starting prices: CA$1,100 to CA$1,500 minimums, first-year jobs to CA$4,500. Below: every Canadian number I could verify by province, the tax for each, and one Ottawa job worked in CAD and USD.
I run a permanent lighting company in Ottawa. The homeowner sites average every job in North America into one number, and the US software vendors quote from them. This page is Canadian, with the source next to every figure. Where a city publishes nothing, I say so rather than make it up.
What Canadian installers publish, by province#
| Province and city |
Installer |
Published figure (CAD) |
What it includes |
| BC, North Vancouver |
Forever Party Rentals |
$8.50 to $12 per linear foot; year two 15 to 25 percent lower |
Commercial LED strands, design, install, in-season maintenance, takedown, storage |
| BC, Surrey and Metro Vancouver |
Shine City |
$3 to $8 per linear foot; first year $650 to $1,200; returning 30 to 50 percent less |
Lights, clips, install, takedown on most packages |
| BC, West Vancouver |
Shack Shine |
From $1,100; year two 45 to 55 percent |
Custom-cut lights bought, install, takedown; four-year product commitment |
| ON, Toronto |
Shack Shine |
From $1,100; year two 45 to 55 percent |
Lights bought, install, takedown |
| ON, Toronto and GTA |
LawnSavers |
$1,500 minimum; first year $3,500 to $4,500; after, 45 to 55 percent |
Lights, cords, timers, install, takedown, storage |
| ON, Toronto and GTA |
Tree Doctors |
$200 per hour, crew with boom truck |
Design, install, takedown; trees and tall structures |
| ON, Ottawa |
Christmas Decor Ottawa |
From $1,500; typical $2,500 to $4,000 |
Lights and hardware, install, timer, maintenance checks, takedown in January, storage |
| ON, Ottawa (permanent) |
Right Light |
$28.68 to $41.23 per foot, average $37.30 |
Permanent track system |
| QC, Montreal, Laval, North Shore |
Entretien EXT |
Turnkey from $795 |
Design, LED install, timer, pre-holiday check, takedown, storage |
| AB, Calgary (permanent) |
Illuminate |
$20 to $30 per linear foot; 1,500 sq ft home $2,500 to $3,500 |
Permanent system, September 2025 |
| AB, Edmonton (permanent) |
Darren Does That |
$18.50 to $22 per linear foot plus controller |
Permanent; from the search listing, page blocked our fetch |
| Canada (permanent) |
Diamond Bright, Celebright |
$15 to $30 per linear foot; $3,000 to $6,500 per home |
Permanent, CAD, dated 2025 and 2026 |
Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick: I found Halifax and Winnipeg installers, and every one of them quotes by consultation with no number on the page. If you are in one of those provinces and publish a rate, send it and I will add it with your name on it.
Seasonal per-foot numbers are rare in Canada because most companies here sell a package: lights bought or rented, installed, taken down and stored, priced as a total. That is why the table has more "from $1,500" than "$9 a foot." The per-foot method still sits underneath every one of those totals, and it is how you should build yours.
Price by the linear foot of lit roofline, with a separate rate for each kind of run, and convert nothing. GlowBid's default seasonal rate card is written in US dollars because we launch in USD; here it is beside the CAD equivalent at the Bank of Canada rate of 1.3840 on September 4, 2026, so you can see where it sits against the table above. Installers set their own numbers; these are a starting point.
| Run type |
GlowBid default (USD) |
CAD at 1.3840 |
Where Canadian pages sit |
| Roofline, per lit foot, lights included |
$8.00 |
$11.07 |
$8.50 to $12 (North Vancouver); $3 to $8 (Surrey) |
| Ridge line, per foot |
$8.00 |
$11.07 |
Not published |
| Peak, per foot plus 15 percent premium |
$9.00 ($10.35 effective) |
$12.46 ($14.32) |
Not published; "multiple roof lines, steep roofs" listed as cost drivers in Montreal |
| Jump, per unlit foot |
$4.00 |
$5.54 |
Not published |
| Ground and walkway, per foot |
$5.00 |
$6.92 |
Not published |
| Tree wrap, per foot |
$6.00 |
$8.30 |
Tree work billed hourly in Toronto ($200 per hour crew) |
| Seasonal service on customer-owned lights, per foot of roofline |
$3.00 |
$4.15 |
Year-two pricing at 45 to 55 percent (Toronto, West Vancouver) |
| Second storey |
10 percent on each upper-storey run |
same |
Not published |
| Timer |
$45 |
$62 |
Included in most Canadian packages |
| Minimum job |
$1,500 |
$2,076 |
$1,500 CAD (LawnSavers, Christmas Decor Ottawa); $1,100 (Shack Shine) |
| Deposit |
30 percent at signing |
same |
Not published |
Two things stand out. The Canadian minimums are CA$1,100 to CA$1,500 where the default card's minimum converts to CA$2,076, so a Canadian installer starting from the default should probably lower the minimum and keep the per-foot rate. And the North Vancouver page is the only seasonal per-foot rate in the country that includes storage, at CA$8.50 to CA$12; if you include storage, you are in that range or you are underpriced. The full per-foot method, including premiums and add-ons, is in the seasonal pricing guide.
Which tax goes on the quote?#
Name the tax on the quote by province, because a homeowner in Ottawa expects to see "HST 13%" and a homeowner in Calgary expects "GST 5%." Rates from the Canada Revenue Agency as of April 1, 2025, with the provincial taxes from each province's own page:
| Province or territory |
Tax on the quote |
Rate |
On a CA$2,000 job |
| Ontario |
HST |
13% |
$260.00 |
| New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island |
HST |
15% |
$300.00 |
| Nova Scotia |
HST (dropped from 15% on April 1, 2025) |
14% |
$280.00 |
| Quebec |
GST 5% plus QST 9.975%, each on the pre-tax price |
14.975% |
$299.50 |
| British Columbia |
GST 5% plus PST 7% |
12% |
$240.00 |
| Manitoba |
GST 5% plus RST 7% |
12% |
$240.00 |
| Saskatchewan |
GST 5% plus PST 6% |
11% |
$220.00 |
| Alberta, Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut |
GST |
5% |
$100.00 |
The GST and HST figures are the CRA's; the BC and Manitoba rates were checked on the provincial pages on September 7, 2026; the Saskatchewan and Quebec pages blocked our fetch, so those two rates come from the government listings and are worth a glance from your accountant. Whether provincial PST applies to installation labour as well as the goods varies by province and is exactly the kind of question to ask that accountant once, in September. GlowBid's rate card holds one tax percent and one label that you set once; a company working across a provincial border needs to check that line before a quote goes out.
What does the cold do to the price?#
It shortens the season and lengthens the job, and the price has to carry both. Our Ottawa install window runs from mid-October to the end of November, and freezing rain takes days out of it. A crew that can hang 400 ft on a dry November afternoon hangs 250 ft in sleet with gloves on. Alberta installers lose the back end of the window to early snow; the coast loses days to rain rather than ice, but a wet steel roof is a wet steel roof.
Three ways that shows up in a Canadian rate card. A rush premium for the last two weeks before December, 20 percent on GlowBid's default card, because that is when every call comes and every roof is icy. A storey premium, 10 percent per storey above the first by default, and I would not go lower in a snow province. And a firm minimum, because a CA$600 bungalow at minus 20 is a money-losing morning once you count the drive.
Minus 30 also changes the product. Clips go brittle, cord jackets stiffen, and a strand that tested fine in the shop fails on the roof. Add the materials buffer (10 percent on ordered footage by default, never on the price), test every strand warm, and write into the agreement that install dates depend on weather. The seasonal contract template has that clause.
Returning customers, takedown and storage#
Price year two as a labour job, not a discount. The Canadian pages agree on the shape: Shack Shine and LawnSavers put year two at 45 to 55 percent of year one in Toronto and West Vancouver; Forever Party Rentals says 15 to 25 percent lower in North Vancouver, where the first-year rate already includes storage. GlowBid's default card handles it as a separate product line, seasonal service on customer-owned lights, at $3 per foot of roofline (CA$4.15), and the quote says plainly that the strands are the homeowner's and their failure is not on you.
Takedown is bundled on every Canadian page that publishes a price, and storage on most. Bundle it, schedule it for January, and put the window in the agreement; a customer who has to phone for takedown is a customer who may not re-book. If you send a re-book text in September, that is a commercial electronic message under Canada's anti-spam legislation, which requires consent and an unsubscribe. GlowBid's texting records consent and handles opt-outs, and the Pro follow-up sequences carry the identification and unsubscribe pieces; the CASL follow-up templates page goes through the wording.
A worked example: a two-storey in Barrhaven, in CAD#
A two-storey in Barrhaven, C9 LED warm white at 12 inches, lights included, takedown in January included, priced on GlowBid's default seasonal card converted to CAD at 1.3840 and rounded to the cent. Replace the rates with yours; the method is the point.
| Line |
Footage |
Rate (CAD) |
Amount (CAD) |
| Roofline, ground floor |
78 ft |
$11.07/ft |
$863.46 |
| Roofline, second storey |
52 ft |
$11.07/ft plus 10% storey premium |
$633.20 |
| Peaks (two gables, four runs, second storey) |
72 ft |
$12.46/ft plus 15% peak and 10% storey premiums, each on the base |
$1,121.40 |
| Jumps (three) |
20 ft |
$5.54/ft |
$110.80 |
| Timer |
1 |
$62.00 |
$62.00 |
| Subtotal |
|
|
$2,790.86 |
| HST (Ontario, 13%) |
|
|
$362.81 |
| Total |
|
|
$3,153.67 (about US$2,279 at 1.3840) |
| Deposit to book (30% of the taxed total) |
|
|
$946.10 |
| Balance on completion |
|
|
$2,207.57 |
That CA$2,791 before tax sits inside Christmas Decor Ottawa's published CA$2,500 to CA$4,000 for a full roofline job, which is the sanity check I want on any rate card. The 130 ft of roofline came from the homeowner's driveway photo, scaled from the 16 ft garage door; the quote says so and says the footage is confirmed on site, and the drawing carries a source tag and a confidence level on every run. If the tape says 138 ft, the crew installs and the invoice shows the true footage; if it says 170 ft, the homeowner gets a call first. Measure this house in the free tool and you will see where the 130 ft comes from; the measuring guide covers the scale step.
Mistakes we have made in Canadian winters#
- Quoting in September at a per-foot rate that made sense in a dry October and installing in December sleet at a loss. The rush premium exists for a reason; use it.
- Leaving the tax off the quote and adding it on the invoice. The homeowner remembers the first number. Print "HST 13%" on the quote.
- Setting the minimum from a US guide. CA$2,000 minimums do not book bungalows in Ottawa; CA$1,500 does, and the table above says the market agrees.
- Skipping the storey premium on a "small" second-storey run. The ladder move is the same size whatever the run is.
- Hanging customer-owned strands on the lights-included price sheet, then replacing dead strands for free in week two. Use the seasonal-service line and say whose product it is.
- Sending a re-book text to last year's list with no unsubscribe line. CASL does not care that it was a nice message.
- Trusting a photo measurement on the run that angles away from the camera. It reads short every time; type the tape length.
Permanent lighting in Canada, briefly#
Permanent is a different price sheet and a different page. The Canadian figures are consistent: CA$15 to CA$30 per linear foot at Diamond Bright, CA$20 to CA$30 in Calgary, CA$18.50 to CA$22 in Edmonton, CA$28.68 to CA$41.23 at Right Light in Ottawa, and CA$3,000 to CA$6,500 per home at Celebright. The Canadian permanent cost page works the same two-storey on an example Ottawa track card to the total, with HST.
GlowBid was built in Ottawa by an installer who pays HST. The rate card takes your CAD numbers by run type, the quote carries the tax line your province expects, the homeowner signs on a phone and pays the deposit on the same page, and the takedown job is created when the seasonal agreement is signed. The founding price is $299 a year for Core, billed in USD, about CA$414 today, and the full pricing is on one page. Start with the free tool and the rate card follows.
