Pricing

While browsing through the various postings by my classmates this week I came upon  calvin kwok`s blog  entry about the Blackberry Bold 9780 and how the price for this phone differs from Telus to Rogers to Bell. This started me thinking not only about price discrepancies in the marketplace, but also about why companies retain loyal customers despite having higher prices than other companies in the same field. The main thought I had is that these companies are actually in the business of providing a service, and that they use products mainly to attract customers. But once they have the customer, the service will be what keeps them. Products are generally bundled together with a package of services, and it is the package that needs to be examined for value not just the product. For example, two years ago I had a package from Rogers that offered me international phone calls for $1.75 per minute. Then Rogers offered a Blackberry that came with a package of $.30 per minute. As an international student this was a quite a savings, and this is the main reason I would hesitate to switch to another company just because their latest Blackberry was a lower price than Rogers.