The Pricing Guys

How do you price software when AI can copy it quickly and cheaply? In this episode of The Pricing Guys, Avy Punwasee and Michael Stanisz of Revenue Management Labs break down what AI agents that can replicate software mean for value-based pricing, subscription costs, and competitive moats.  Michael and Avy start with a story about AI agents recreating entire apps and video games from existing prod...

Avy and Michael go virtual for a lighter episode, pulling pricing lessons from one of Michael’s favourite shows, The Office . They start with the Michael Scott Paper Company. After quitting Dunder Mifflin, Michael undercuts his old employer on price and wins account after account, until his accountant points out that selling paper for less than it costs means the company loses more money the bigge...

A new AI competitor just launched at half your price and your sales team is hearing about it on every renewal call. What do you do? Michael and Avy put that exact question into Gemini and let it build out a three point pricing strategy live on camera. Then they tear it apart. In this episode they get into why Gemini’s first instinct to offer discounts and multi year contracts misses the most impor...

Pricing teams have spent decades chasing the power of 1%. Governments are out here moving 50% overnight. So what does that mean for the people whose job it is to manage pricing strategy? Michael and Avy tackle a question that came in from a listener and it is one of the most relevant conversations happening in boardrooms right now. Tariffs are moving faster and bigger than any pricing team was bui...

Nearly 2,700 stores. Zero cans of Red Bull . Is Kroger fighting for shoppers or fighting for margin? Michael Stanisz and Avy Punwasee, managing partners at Revenue Management Labs (RML), break down one of the biggest retailer vs. supplier standoffs of 2026. Kroger's new CEO Greg Foran has vowed to push back on suppliers raising prices, and Red Bull's coolers were gone by August 31. Two heavyweight...

A shopper finds a great deal on Walmart for a hard drive, leaves the tab open, comes back and the price has jumped by $110. His wife searches the same item on the same day and gets it for the original price. So what actually happened?   Michael and Avy read and react to a viral Reddit post about Walmart's dynamic pricing and use it to break down one of the most misunderstood topics in retail prici...

Everyone is using AI. The question Michael and Avy keep getting is: if I can just ask ChatGPT or Claude for the answer, why do I need a pricing expert ? It is a fair question and they do not dodge it. This episode goes deep on where AI actually falls short in pricing and why the gap between getting an answer and making it stick is bigger than most companies realize. In this episode Michael and Avy...

We have a special bonus episode to share and it comes with some exciting news from RML! Gustavo Mendonça is joining as a Partner to lead a brand new function at Revenue Management Labs: building custom pricing tools. Michael and Avy sit down with Gustavo to break down what this means for RML, why he left one of the biggest food companies in the world to do it, and what the democratization of AI ac...

The 2 Biggest Pricing Trends Right Now The FIFA World Cup just landed in North America and the attorney general is already involved. Ticket prices surged 35% overnight, seat maps got redrawn, and fans are furious. Michael and Avy use this as the jumping off point for the Season 3 finale and a bigger conversation about the two pricing trends reshaping how companies compete right now. In this episod...

Ferrari just dropped an electric vehicle priced at $640K+ and watched their stock fall 8%. What went wrong? Michael and Avy break down the pricing and brand strategy lessons behind Ferrari's Luce EV launch, and why even the most research-backed innovation can miss the mark when it alienates your core customer. They cover why expanding your customer base is the hardest growth play in the book, what...

Disney doesn't sell rides. They sell an ecosystem designed to keep you spending as long as possible. Michael sat down with CJ Gustafson of Mostly Metrics to unpack the surprisingly sophisticated pricing strategy behind the Disney experience. From loss leader ticket pricing and frictionless wristband payments to dynamic lightning lane offers and segmented Florida resident discounts. Sharp observati...

In this special episode of The Pricing Guys, Avy and Michael welcome Kevin Mitchell, President of the Professional Pricing Society (PPS), for a candid conversation about the past, present, and future of pricing. Kevin traces the roots of PPS back to his father Eric Mitchell, who did pricing work for Ford, Xerox, and Intel before launching the society out of a newsletter Kevin used to print and mai...

What can a New York City dollar slice teach you about pricing strategy? Quite a bit, it turns out. In this episode, Michael and Avy use pizza as a lens to explore real-world pricing dynamics: the volume game behind the dollar slice, how atmosphere and customer segments justify price gaps, and why brands have to commit to a single pricing identity. They also make the case that Dave Portnoy's One Bi...

What does ketchup have to do with brand value? More than you'd think. Michael and Avy dig into one of the most underrated questions in pricing: when you strip away the logo, the mascot, and the packaging redesign, what is your brand actually worth? The Heinz story out of Turkey is the jumping off point, but this episode goes much deeper into why so many companies are spending millions to justify t...

Is your grocery app charging you more than your neighbor? Welcome to surveillance pricing. Avy Punwasee and Michael Stanisz break down the pricing practice that's got Ontario Premier Doug Ford talking and consumers quietly fuming. Surveillance pricing (aka AI-powered price discrimination) is already happening on grocery apps, and the debate over whether to ban it is heating up. But here's the thin...

What does "price" even mean in a world run by AI? In this episode, Michael and Avy skip the near-term AI hype and fast-forward 10 to 15 years to ask the big questions. Are promotions obsolete? Will brands live or die by their ability to communicate value to an algorithm? And is B2B pricing about to go completely underground? From shopper bots that buy your toilet paper at the optimal moment, to th...

Are pricing teams their own worst enemy?  In this episode of The Pricing Guys, Michael and Avy are calling out a growing trend in the pricing community: a victim mentality showing up all over LinkedIn, where pricing professionals feel undervalued, ignored, and like they're the only ones driving results in their organizations. But here's the hot take: if no one's listening to you, that might be on...

Have you ever picked up a piece of clothing in a store and noticed the price tag was... blank? Target made headlines when they quietly removed price points from tags on select clothing items, and the guys are unpacking what's really going on. In this episode, we dig into the operational reasoning Target offered (spoiler: it involves tariffs and cost volatility), and why that explanation doesn't fu...

In this episode of The Pricing Guys, Avy and Michael unpack ‬ Apple 's latest iPhone pricing move and why holding price flat while adding value is more strategic than it looks. What starts as a discussion about the new iPhone and iPad turns into a broader conversation about price-volume tradeoffs, consumer caution, and what it means when a category leader decides not to take price. They explore wh...

Seat-based SaaS pricing helped fuel the software boom for more than a decade. But that model is starting to show cracks. In this episode of The Pricing Guys, Michael and Avy unpack why many technology companies are moving away from traditional seat-based subscriptions and exploring usage-based or hybrid pricing models. Ironically, the same industry that popularized subscription pricing is now lead...

Michael and Avy are back for Season 3 of The Pricing Guys. To kick things off, we’re testing a simple question. Do pricing experts actually know the price of everyday products? From hotel water bottles to Hugo Boss t-shirts, baby formula, marinara sauce, and Excel gum, we put our instincts to the test in a rapid-fire guessing game. Some answers are close. Others not so much. It’s a good reminder o...

The 2026 Executive Pricing Survey Results Are In In this special announcement from the Pricing Guys, Michael Stanisz and Avy Punwasee share early insights from RML’s latest research. Drawing on input from over 330 executive leaders, the 2026 Executive Pricing Benchmarks looks at how pricing performed in 2025, where leaders set targets, what was actually achieved, and how pricing is shaping plans f...

To wrap up season two, Avy and Michael share the four pricing trends that will define 2026.  You will hear their take on hybrid pricing models, the need for simpler pricing structures, the continued growth of outcome based pricing, and why low cost entry points matter more as budgets tighten. A clear, practical outlook for anyone planning pricing or revenue strategy for the new year. Season three...

A barbershop in London offering a monthly haircut subscription sparked a bigger question for us. Have subscription models stretched too far or are they simply evolving into new industries? In this episode, we break down the real tradeoffs behind subscription pricing. We look at retention goals, churn signals, capacity limits, customer behavior, tipping dynamics, and why fixed capacity businesses l...

Tareq Hadhad, founder and CEO of Peace by Chocolate, joins The Pricing Guys to share why purpose is not a cost. It is an investment that builds trust, pricing power, and long-term brand strength. He explains how real premium pricing comes from story, experience, and service rather than a higher sticker price. We also dive into how Gen Z votes with their wallets, rewarding companies that act with a...