Pricing is a perennial pain point for landscape business owners. Even if you’re comfortable with your current pricing levels, how do you feel when it comes time to raise prices? On edge, I’d bet. Who wouldn’t be? That’s why this article piqued my interest this week.
“The Art of Ra
ising Prices: Lessons from Amazon Prime”
Harvard Business Review
There’s an art to pricing and even the masters don’t always execute perfectly, according to this Harvard Business Review article about Amazon’s bid to raise prices for its Prime service by 25 percent. This run-down of what the company did right and what it could have done better by Rafi Mohammed, a pricing consultant and author, is enlightening for any business.
Some of the tips are straightforward and you’re probably already doing them, like blaming costs and appealing to fairness (as in, “Our fuel costs are through the roof; besides, we haven’t raised your prices in years!”). Others are more subtle and may be worth considering as you renegotiate contracts or send pre-pay letters for next year. These include floating a scarier number, reminding customers of the value they’re getting and offering good/better/best options.
I’d like to know, did you raise prices this year? If so, by how much and how did it go over?
About the Author: Marisa Palmieri
Marisa Palmieri is an experienced Green Industry editor who's won numerous awards for her coverage of the landscape and golf course markets from the Turf & Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA), the Press Club of Cleveland and the American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE). In 2007, ASBPE named her a Young Leader. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Journalism, cum laude, from Ohio University’s Scripps School of Journalism.Subscribe to Landscape Management
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