Here’s a timely article that makes a good example for our Good Fences Make Good Prices post. about why restaurants offer food service at the bar, and why the level of customer service there may be very different from the main restaurant. In short, the bar option allows the restaurant to serve more cost sensitive customers without allowing higher value customers from sliding down to lower price points.
Another fence I’m running into now is in laptop configuration. I don’t need a state-of-the-art processor or a DVD burner, but I want a nice screen and a lot of memory. Some companies make it hard to take the high end up options I want without paying for the high end options that have little value to me. (I haven’t decided whether to go upmarket, downmarket, or turn to a less-preferred brand that allows me to configure a system exactly as I want it.)
What other fences do we encounter? What makes a good fence?