What makes a customer pay more?

A better product still needs a reason to buy

Put two mattresses next to each other on a website. One is more expensive, has more layers and carries the word Premium. The product team can explain every difference. The customer is still asking a simpler question: what will I notice, and is it worth the extra money?

That question runs through much of my work, from product and category roles at Emma to leading its Spanish business and advising Calm. When a premium product underperforms, I want to understand whether people value the benefit, understand the difference and can justify the upgrade price. Each answer leads to a different commercial decision.

My starting point is to design the product choice and its economics together. A useful upgrade gives the customer a meaningful benefit at an acceptable additional price, while leaving the business better off after the switch. Getting those three things right can improve what a brand earns from the demand it already has and create more room to invest in growth.

Start with the difference the customer can feel

Working with sleep products taught me how easily a specification can become a substitute for a proposition. More foam, a different spring system or an adjustable layer can matter. But the customer needs to understand how that changes comfort, movement, handling or daily use.

Emma's customer research repeatedly brought this distinction into focus. People could describe how they wanted a pillow to feel more easily than they could navigate our technical categories. Making a feature visible was only the first step. Explaining how to use it and why it mattered was a separate job.

Before changing a price, I would ask a few customers to compare the products in their own words. If they cannot explain the difference, test clearer comparison copy, a demonstration or a short video at the existing price. If they understand the benefit but do not want it, reconsider the proposition or who it serves. A softer mattress, for example, is a preference for some customers rather than an upgrade for everyone.

Price the step between products

At Calm in Argentina, one of the commercial questions we worked on was how to encourage more customers to consider Híbrido alongside Original. We examined the price difference between them and the economics of the products, rather than treating each price as an isolated decision.

Across the documented May to August 2026 work, the upgrade gap narrowed and the team's reviews recorded a larger Híbrido share of web mattress sales value. That was a useful signal about customer choice. It did not, by itself, prove the size of the profit improvement or isolate price from every other change in the business.

The lesson I take from it is to evaluate the additional payment against the additional value. A product may look reasonably priced against a competitor and still sit too far from the alternative on your own site. Equally, narrowing the gap too much can give away margin to people who were already willing to upgrade.

There is no percentage gap I would copy into every business. Customer budgets, benefits, costs and the role of each product differ. Even within mattresses, a change in firmness, an upgrade within a family and a move into a luxury range are different decisions. A competitor's price ladder is useful context; it cannot tell you which ladder will be profitable for your customers.

More premium sales can still leave less profit

Here is a simplified example. An entry product sells for €500 and contributes €200 per order. A premium product sells for €700 and contributes €280. With 100 orders split 70 entry and 30 premium, the range generates €22,400 in contribution.

Now reduce the premium price to €650. With its variable cost unchanged, contribution falls to €230 per order. Suppose premium orders rise from 30 to 50 while total orders stay at 100. Premium unit share looks much better, and revenue rises from €56,000 to €57,500. Yet total contribution falls to €21,500.

The reason is straightforward. The original 30 premium buyers now each pay €50 less, costing €1,500. The 20 customers who switch from entry add only €30 each in contribution, recovering €600. The business is €900 worse off. At the same 100 orders, premium would need to reach 80 orders just to restore the original contribution.

This is why I check the whole range. Additional conversion could make the cut worthwhile, and different costs would change the result. But a higher premium share is a diagnosis of what customers bought, not a sufficient reason to keep the offer.

Make the bundle a useful purchase

The same logic applies to bundles. In my work with Calm, the idea behind a hero mattress, base and pillow combination was to make a complete bedroom purchase easier to understand and buy. A customer should be able to see what is included, why the pieces belong together and what the extra spend buys.

Emma's experience also taught me to look beyond the larger basket. A bed or accessory bundle can lift the order value while contributing less than the mattress would have on its own. A free pillow can encourage a purchase, but it can also replace a pillow the customer would have paid for.

I compare the proposed bundle with the basket we would otherwise expect to sell. That means including the cost of the gift, lost paid accessory sales, financing, delivery and returns. Then I check whether all the required sizes and components can actually be delivered together. A commercially attractive bundle creates an operational obligation as well as a sale.

Read the days after the promotion

At Emma Spain, our summer 2025 review showed why the promotion window alone could mislead us. Extra coupons coincided with stronger revenue per session while the offer ran, followed by weaker performance afterward. The estimated benefit over the full week was much smaller than the offer-period peak suggested.

That experience changed the question I want a promotion review to answer. How much extra contribution did we create across the offer and the period that followed? Some customers may simply have brought forward a purchase. Others may have moved from a full-price product into the promotion.

Price presentation also needs care. A larger discount badge and a lower payable price are different changes. If the objective is to test communication, keep the actual offer constant and use a reference price the business can substantiate. If the objective is to change the upgrade price, calculate what happens to the whole range after every eligible code and payment condition.

Choose the intervention that matches the problem

For a founder, the useful output of this work is a decision. I would start with one commercially important product pair, rather than redesigning the entire catalogue at once. Look at customer understanding, final prices, product-level economics, purchase patterns and stock availability together.

• Customers cannot explain the benefit: test the comparison and demonstration at unchanged prices.
• Customers value the benefit but reject the extra spend: test a bounded upgrade-price or payment offer, including its financing cost.
• The upgrade sells but weakens total contribution: revisit the discount, bundle contents, costs or product role.
• Customers want the offer but cannot get their size or a credible delivery date: fix availability and fulfilment before interpreting it as a pricing failure.

Connect the offer to the growth plan

Agree the economics with Finance, make the offer clear with Product and E-commerce, and align Marketing with the same proposition. Keep the comparison as stable as possible, record changes in traffic and availability, and evaluate category contribution per visitor alongside absolute contribution. Allow for cancellations and returns, including a later review when trial periods are long.

Better contribution per customer can create room to spend more on acquisition while maintaining profit. That room still needs to be tested against the cost of reaching additional customers. It is a reason to revisit the growth budget, not a guarantee that the next euro of media will perform like the last.

The work I find most valuable with a team is connecting these decisions: which customer we want to serve, which product deserves their money, how we price the choice and how we deliver it profitably. Start with one upgrade on your own site. If you can make that choice easier for the customer and better for the business, you have a concrete place to build growth.