Maybe It’s Not the Price

When a product or service isn’t selling, the first reaction is often to cut the price. Sometimes the price cut works, but in many cases price was never the issue.

From the world of sports comes news that Barry Bonds’ agent has offered Bonds’ services to all 30 major league baseball teams for a pro-rated share of the major league minimum salary — $390,000. To give you an idea of the magnitude of the discount this represents, you should know that Bonds made $15,800,000 last year.

To generate a “sale” of Barry Bonds’ services, his agent cut the price by 97%. Which is the most he could cut it without violating the collective bargaining agreement. And to sweeten the deal, he offered to have Barry spend his entire salary on tickets for underprivileged youth. So Barry Bonds, in essence, is available for free to any major league team who wants him.

There are no takers.

Got something that isn’t selling? Maybe price isn’t the issue.

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Categories: Marketing, Phil Bernstein, Sales
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3 thoughts on “Maybe It’s Not the Price”

  1. Phil, It comes down to the 3 Ps–price, product and promotion. So you need to have a great product at a good price and promote the heck out of it. Apparently, Bonds has both the promotion and the price locked up but he has some product issues (needs special care…e.g medications and court fees).

    Reply

  2. Good reminder in this economy–Phil. It’s not always best to cut prices. It’s more effective to offer the absolute best product/service and hold your price steady (as much as possible).

    Suzanne

    Reply

  3. Thanks for the comment, Suzanne. If the seller wants to sell and the buyer wants to buy, it’s usually possible to work out a price that both can live with. Deborah’s got it pegged — the problem here is that nobody wants the product at any price.

    In the auto business, a good parallel to Bonds’ agent would be a Hummer dealer — he had a hot product two years ago but something very important has changed…

    Reply