If I’ve learned anything in my career, it’s that the best price is not always the best deal.  In fact, I’d say it’s seldom the best deal.  What so many people fail to realize is that price is less than half the equation.  What you’re really looking for is value — or more accurately stated, what you’re looking for is the price / value relationship.

For example: there are two cars, same model year, same color, same equipment.  One has 100,000 miles and costs $5,000.  The other has 50,000 miles and is $5,500.  Even though the second car is $500 more expensive, it is by far the better deal.  If you were thinking about buying one of these cars, you’d be crazy to buy the cheaper car.  The more expensive car would give you two to three times the life.

It’s true for everything.  We talk all the time about “bang for the buck,” and that’s really what you look for.  People say you get what you pay for.  The inverse is also true:  you don’t get what you don’t pay for.  Sure, you can pay too much and not get the bang you’re looking for.  But more often you leave the things that are important on the table by buying the cheap stuff.

I remember selling skis when I was in college.  People would come in and I would show them the good stuff.  They would say, “Oh, that’s much too expensive.  I think I’ll go with this cheaper stuff.”  They would buy it, use it one season and come back next year and do the same thing.  Over two or three years they spent the same amount of money as the people who bought the good stuff right from the get-go, but they had three years of paying to ski on equipment they really never enjoyed.  ‘

Contrast that with the people who bought the good stuff right up front.  They had three years of very enjoyable skiing.  At $60 dollars (or more) a day for skiing, three years represents a significant sum of money spent to not enjoy yourself.  So what was the better deal?

My motto is, “I’ve never been unhappy with the best.”  It’s when you buy the cheap stuff you’re not happy.  So you suffer with it until you can’t stand it anymore, then go get some more cheap stuff and start the process over.  That’s not for me.

The bottom line in all this?  Buy value not price.  Don’t dismiss the best just because it’s expensive.  You don’t get what you don’t pay for.  The best price is seldom the best deal.