Packaging products and services is essential marketing strategy these days. And when I say packaging I’m not referring to Corn Flakes boxes. I mean packaging products and services into product bundles. If you haven’t noticed the abundance of product bundles and packages, let me list a few examples for you.
- The value meal you bought at McDonald’s is a bundle slightly discounted from ala carte pricing, to entice multiple purchases opposed to “onesy” buying.
- The new computer (C.P.U.) you bought probably was included in a bundled package of monitor, keyboard, printer, mouse and assorted software. Slightly better pricing than buying all items at regular list price prompted you to buy more than you actually intended.
- The health club membership you bought was for 12 weeks and included a session or two with a personal trainer and a consulting session with a dietician. The pricing made the package deal a bargain with the extras as opposed to “pay as you go”, week by week.
So what’s the big deal about bundling into packages? The big deal is more profit for your bottom line. The big deal is more revenue per customer. The big deal is more profit from fewer customers.
If your horse business is stuck with the single unit pricing methodology think about making some changes to sell bundled services.
Your lesson program is an obvious place to start.
I talked with long time professional horseman Reinhard Teetor of Pine Plains, NY about bundled lesson programs.
In a prior position as a farm manager, he adopted a systematic approach for reviving a week by week lesson program in financial shambles. He divided the year into seven week “semesters”. Each semester was six weeks of instruction and one week available as a make up week. Terms were simple: pay up front, show up same time, same channel each week. Make ups available, otherwise use it or lose it. Reinhard advises to start semesters on January 1 of each year to make a riding lesson package an easy gift purchase in December.
There is nothing new about this; many professionals have been using this type of program with excellent results for years. For the others, I suspect many will benefit with this bundling strategy.
Unless you happen to like and enjoy these frequent pay as you go lesson questions:
“Can I pay you next week for this lesson and next week?”,
“I can’t come for two weeks, will you hold my spot?“,
“Sorry, I forgot to call you about this week’s lesson appointment.”
Consumers are well conditioned to bundled services.
-You can’t buy youth soccer league participation game by game,
-You can’t pay for a college course by the days you choose to attend,
-And you probably wouldn’t even consider anything but a bundle of classes at parachute school.
Continuing with this theme, what else can you bundle in your business?
*An “owner lesson” each week with their horses also enrolled in a training program,
*a ground work seminar with an adult lesson package
*or a closed “graduation horse show” for students at the close of a lesson semester.
Better profits can start with packaged value deals to up sell your existing clients.