Cost quality-aspiration

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Balance of cost, quality and aspiration: A must at any price point

Senior management “Principles of Marketing” course at Indian Institute of Management (IIM)

Shombit Sengupta

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W H I T E P A P E R


Cost Quality Aspiration

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The balance of cost, quality and aspiration at any price point of any product or service is a must for tomorrow’s forward looking marketing.

The selling price of any product or service is a big factor for target customers, whether the category is low or high priced.

COST DESIGN

Most people do not flaunt money without having the appropriate result from any product.

Humane industrial design, is the balance of the 3 elements of cost, quality and aspiration.

Material cost is difficult to control because of market dynamics such as inflation. There will always be a bunch of competitors in any product category, but material cost could be the same for everybody. How can one player overcome another?


The pulley system is an ideal metaphor of reduce effort, increase comfort, which in customer usage experience, changes the paradigm.

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A strong cue to get customer mindshare is added perceptible functional benefit. This can change the volume game. Production cost decreases when you have more volume.

ID Product Design is based on the ideology of “reduce effort, increase comfort.” which obviously adds functional benefit for the user.

Excellence of functionality is the crux in the evolution of ID Product Design.Examples that effectively display functional excellence ranges from the steam engine to TGV, propeller planes to supersonic Concorde, basic canvas keds to Nike

But usage superiority is not a matter of automation or scientific lab work; rather it is about understanding the consumer in the psychological lab.

The unsaid aspect in any product usage is the microtone functional improvement parameters that customers perceive.

That’s why, to understand gaps in functionality, we need the combined physiological and psychological balance of consumers.

sports shoes, ink for pen to refill ball pens, typewriter to computer, carbon copy to photocopy, cash payment to card payment among many others.


Humane industrial design is discovering the unique functionality that customers care to use, such as an air bag in a car.

Generic

Unique

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In any price segment, whether it is high or low, if the functional superiority is obvious and universal, it would mean volume sales will grow. This would automatically bring down the cost of production.

The consumer’s mind always moves towards 2 baskets, the generic or unique.

An analogy for the unique find is the gold micro particles mixed with sand or hidden in rock, while something very easily found is the generic.


Rado $ 7000

Tag Heuer $ 4000

Rolex $ 10000

Swatch $ 30

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A product should visibly reflect its

quality in the customer’s hand. This will

encourage the customer’s confidence

as the quality of the product’s hidden

mechanism cannot be seen at the

moment of purchase or during usage.

People discover its intrinsic quality with

the passage of time.

The proven example of how the manufacturer has never compromised on quality is the $ 30 Swatch watch which has never failed in any quality parameter. And Swatch is no less in aspiration than any other costly watch.

QUALITY DESIGN:

It’s no longer true that only

sophisticated, expensive products will

have quality.

Customers get multiple options in the

market today where both quality and

reasonable cost meet their expectation.

In buying Chinese products customers

don’t expect quality beyond a certain

limit as they think they are gaining in

better price advantage.

A branded mass product has to assure

unconditional quality during its durable

usage cycle. Otherwise the customer

gets placed in a trade off situation

between a Chinese product and a well

known branded product.


ASPIRATIONAL DESIGN Aspiration is an important element for sales growth. Once upon a time, it was the aspiration of royalty or feudal lords that decided on functionality excellence.

People’s aspiration level shot up significantly after World War II. The free economy is a key driver for the growth of aspiration. The growth of industry and globalization led to an obsession for mass production to have control over the global market. From the value game, it became the numbers game.

Car ownership limited to only rich people before World War II

People’s car “Volkswagen” in mass production unit after World War II

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Feudal LordWhen democracy came, the economic level of people rose, and product functionality became a factor for multiple societies to express through their purchase behaviour. This was the beginning of the creation of the mass market.


Even seemingly irrelevant distribution logistics system can totally destroy the business result of humane industrial design products.

See how Swatch customises its store according to the locality.

How can we bring this aspiration to every price point through humane industrial design?

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Swatch store in Time Square, New York Swatch in Soho,

New York

Here aspiration can be transcended from multiple areas such as functionality beyond expectation, high order intensity in user friendliness, touch and feel of the product, in aesthetics which amount to high craftsmanship and the skill of art in business.


If you only think of business, art will escape you; and with art alone you will not make business. You require the finesse of art that drives business through design.

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But the perfection of these 3 designs depends on marketing design, in how, and in what context, you sell the product.

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A technical tool makes only a stereo typed industrial design product

An artistic tool for thinking of humane industrial design can create high volume products

So design that sells a product has 3 components:

• Cost design with uncommon functional superiority • Quality design at any price point • Aspirational design at any price point

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Cost quality-aspiration

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