The $400 package nobody orders (and why it's making you money anyway)

Here's a pricing trick that took me way too long to figure out: put a package on your menu that you don't actually want to sell. I call it the decoy. Here's how it works. Most operators offer two packages — something like a $800 basic and a $1,100 premium. Clients look at both, feel the gap, and a big chunk of them default to the cheap one. Now add a third option at $1,400. Full bells and whistles — green screen, AI effects, animated photos, custom backdrop, the works. Price it high enough that it feels like a stretch for most people. Watch what happens. Suddenly your $1,100 package doesn't feel expensive anymore. It feels like the smart middle choice. The $1,400 package is doing a job just by sitting there on the page — it makes everything below it feel reasonable. This is anchoring. Fancy restaurants have been doing it for decades with the second-cheapest bottle of wine. You can do it with booths. I've talked to operators who added a high-end anchor package and saw their $1,100 bookings jump from maybe 30% of closes to closer to 55%, with no change to their pitch and no change to what they were actually delivering. The menu did the work. The point: people don't evaluate prices in isolation. They evaluate them relative to what's around them. Give them something to anchor against, and they'll happily pay more for the middle option.

Derek runs a solo operation in Columbus, Ohio — mostly corporate holiday parties, nonprofit galas, the occasional university event. For three years his pricing was dead simple: $850 for four hours, prints included. That was it. One package, take it or leave it. His close rate was fine — around 65% — but his average booking never moved. He was stuck at $850 per gig and couldn't figure out how to push past it without feeling like he was just asking for more money. Last spring he rebuilt his pricing page. He kept his base package at $850. Added a mid-tier at $1,150 that included animated photos and a custom graphic overlay. Then he built out a premium tier at $1,500 — green screen backgrounds, AI-generated photo effects, a branded microsite for sharing. He wasn't sure anyone would actually book the $1,500 package, and honestly, he was okay with that. First month: two clients booked the $1,150 mid-tier, one booked the $1,500. His average booking jumped from $850 to $1,050. Second month: four mid-tier, one premium. Average now sitting at $1,090. What surprised him most was the $1,500 package actually sold twice in Q3 — both corporate clients, both with branded events where the AI effects and green screen made real sense. He delivered both without breaking a sweat. His booth software already had everything built in. "I was basically leaving $300 per booking on the table because I never gave anyone a reason to spend more," he told me. "Adding two lines to a pricing sheet doubled my average ticket in three months." He finished 2024 with $78,000 in revenue. In 2023, same number of gigs, he'd done $54,000.

Before your next quote goes out, add one premium add-on line item — animated photos, AI effects, green screen, extra hour, custom backdrop, whatever fits. Price it $200-$300 above your current package. Don't hide it at the bottom. Put it right at the top, before your normal rate. It reframes everything that comes after it, and you might be surprised how often someone says yes. **