an article from sunsonic®
Most people shopping for meters ask, “How much does it cost?” That’s the wrong question. You should be asking, “How much does it cost me per gallon to measure accurately?”
Let’s look deeper at this.
The wrong math:
Cheap meter = low upfront cost. But cheap meter + poor accuracy + frequent replacement + manual labor = expensive long term.
The right math:
Let’s say a meter costs $50, lasts 10 years, and measures 400 million gallons in that time. To get your cost per gallon, divide the price by the total volume measured: $50 ÷ 400,000,000 gallons = $0.000000125 per gallon. That’s your cost to measure each gallon accurately—just a fraction of a penny. And that’s without factoring in the savings from reliability, fewer service calls, and no missed flow.
Now compare that to a bargain-bin meter. It costs less upfront, sure. Maybe your current meter isn’t the cheapest, but it fails faster, needs more attention, and lets water go unmeasured. How much is it costing you to keep? That’s not savings—that’s silent loss.
If you’re a utility billing entity, inaccurate reads = lost revenue. If you’re a facility manager, missed leaks = inflated water bills and damage. If you’re running multiple buildings, slow reads = labor costs that stack. Stop thinking like you're buying a product. Start thinking like you're buying performance per gallon.
