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Still Don’t Believe in Premium Pricing? Go Pound Sand

Chris Jones
By Chris JonesMar 06, 2017
Chris Jones
Chris Jones is Executive Vice President of Marketing and Services at Descartes Systems. Jones has spent more than 30 years working with manufacturers, retailers, distributors, and logistics providers to improve their supply chain operations. One of his primary missions is to identify and leverage new and counter intuitive activities that make a difference in the business. Jones has held senior positions at Kraft Foods, Descartes, and Gartner. He has a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Lehigh University.
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For the last 5 years, I’ve been saying and writing that differentiated delivery service allows companies to premium price their products and services. Yet, too many companies still don’t believe it. Recently, I found the ultimate example of premium pricing because of differentiated delivery service. The company is BC Sands. Yes, they sell sand and, if someone can sell sand at a premium, then you should be able to do it too for your products. You just need to understand where the differentiated delivery service value point lies for your customers.

BC Sands is a mid-size Australian company that sells and distributes sand to construction and landscaping sites. The construction and landscaping business is very dynamic with project schedules in constant flux. Because labor is such a high cost, contractors place considerable value on being able to make orders for building supplies at late as possible and get visibility about when to expect those orders to keep their crews productive. For BC Sands, many of those orders require same-day delivery.

Many companies struggle to provide same-day delivery because of the inability to offer notification of an impending delivery and high operational costs. What differentiates BC Sands is that it can offer same-day deliveries to its customers. Their customers are willing to pay a “premium” for the speed and reliability of their service. The same technology that is helping BC Sands be faster and deliver with greater precision is also helping them reduce delivery costs by keep the fleet in motion and productive throughout the day. Through a combination of GPS tracking and real-time planning, new orders are automatically evaluated against the live dispatch schedule providing BC Sands’ customers with delivery choices that consider the different costs of those choices.

If you want to know more, BC Sands is coming to the US and speaking at Evolution 2017, Descartes Global User and Partner Conference on March 29th. They have an amazing story and one reinforces the notion of delivery service as a competitive weapon and top line growth opportunity. How is your company using superior delivery service to advance? Let me know.

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