Managerial Economics 2nd Edition by William Boyes

Exercise 17

Knowing the Customer
The typical supermarket has 30,000 different products on sale at any given time. The manager of that supermarket must determine not only what mix of products to have on hand but where to locate those products and what price to set on each one at any specific time. Usually, the price is based on a markup on the cost of the item, and the only reason the price is altered is that costs change. When you reserve a hotel room, you find that there are several different prices offered for that same room, depending on whether you work for the government, are a member of AARP or some other organization, are staying more than one night, and so on. Why doesn't the hotel just offer a single price?
These examples illustrate just a few of the many problems confronting businesses in their relations with customers. Companies do not seem to know much about their customers. For instance, companies often base prices on the anecdotal evidence of a few vocal salespeople or product managers. Even Mercedes-Benz, when it was about to launch one of its A-class models in the German market, initially proposed a price tag of DM29,500, based on little more than the belief that DM30,000 was a psychologically important barrier. Consultants point out that price has a disproportionate effect on the bottom line, far more than greater volume or cuts in fixed and variable costs. Assuming that volumes stay constant, a 1 percent price increase produces between an 8 percent and 11 percent improvement in operating profits.
Are these businesses leaving money on the table-that is, not generating the greatest revenue they could by knowing the customer better?