| INSIDE THIS ISSUE: The 4-part letter that raises your prices on January 1 and makes your customers feel like they caught a break. Plus the full template, ready to copy, and a Your Move you can finish in about an hour. |
Don't Announce a Price Increase. Announce an Upgrade Instead.The Upgrade Letter puts the value first and the price second, so a 10% raise reads like good news. Read this twice, unless you hate money. ↓ Most service owners raise prices like they're pulling off a bandage. Quietly. All at once. Then they wait by the phone and hope nobody notices. Somebody always notices. A longtime customer gets the new invoice, feels ambushed, and calls to ask why. Now you're on the defensive, explaining fuel costs to a woman who's used you for six years. (Or worse, you cave and give her the old price. Then you do it for the next one too.) So most owners do the other thing. They don't raise prices at all. That one's MORE expensive. What waiting one more year costs you Run your own numbers, but here's an example.
| Average job |
$450 |
| Jobs per year |
300 |
| 10% price increase |
+$45 per job |
| Added profit per year |
$13,500 |
| Example numbers. Plug in yours. Same crew, same chemicals, same truck, so every dollar of the increase is profit. |
Meanwhile your insurance went up. Fuel went up. Your guys want raises. If your prices stayed flat this year, you took a pay cut. You just didn't get the memo. The fix: value first, price second Here's the move. You don't announce a price increase. You announce an UPGRADE... and the new price rides in with it. I call it the Upgrade Letter. It goes out in November, so the new rate starts January 1 and nobody gets surprised. It has four parts, in this order: - Good news first. Two paragraphs on what got better before they ever see a number. Make it real and visible: a quality checklist on every visit, photos of the finished work, a dedicated tech.
- A guarantee with teeth. Give it a name. "The Done-Right Guarantee: if anything isn't right, tell us within 48 hours and we come back and fix it, free." Most companies in your town won't put their money where their mouth is.
- The anchor. No apology. "We thought we'd need to raise prices about 25% after reviewing rising costs, but we sharpened our pencil and tightened things up instead."
- The loyal customer rate. "So as a loyal customer, your new price will be..." and the number.
One rule on part 3: only use the 25% if it's TRUE. Run your real numbers first (insurance, fuel, wages, chemicals, equipment). If the honest number is 15%, say 15%. The anchor works because it's real. Why this works so well
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They read two paragraphs of "we got better" before they see a number, so the increase shows up with a reason attached instead of arriving alone. |
✔ |
The anchor does the comparison shopping for them. After 25%, 10% feels like a break, not a hike. |
✔ |
No apology means no negotiation. Groveling trains customers to treat your price as an opening offer. |
This is the Price lever of F.R.A.P. in its purest form. Zero new customers. Zero ad spend. Every dollar lands on the bottom line.
| One F.R.A.P. user found an additional $132,000 in PROFIT after raising prices in 2026. |
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STEAL THIS LETTER Change the highlighted parts. Send it.
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Subject: [First Name], two upgrades coming to your [service] (and one thing you should know) [First Name], I've got some good news and a straight answer for you, because that's how I run things here. First, the good news. Over the last [timeframe], we've been investing in making your experience better. Starting [date], your service includes: 1. [Value point, e.g. a 24-point quality checklist on every visit, with photos of the finished work before we leave your property.] 2. Our new [Guarantee Name, e.g. Done-Right Guarantee]: if anything about your service isn't right, tell us within 48 hours and we come back and fix it, free. No arguing, no fine print. Honestly, this is the part I'm most proud of. Most companies in [City] won't put their money where their mouth is. We are. 3. We thought we'd need to raise prices about [25]% after reviewing rising costs, but we sharpened our pencil and tightened things up instead. So as a loyal customer, your new price will be [$$$]. No action needed on your end. Your new rate starts [date] and will show on your next [invoice/booking]. Thanks for trusting us with your [home/business]. We don't take that lightly. [Your Name]
[Company] | [Phone] |
Two checks before you send it. First, pick upgrades a customer can actually see. A checklist, photos, a faster response time. "Improved quality" doesn't survive scrutiny. Second, look at the dollars. If 10% of your average ticket is under about $10, your raise probably isn't aggressive enough.
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YOUR MOVE THIS WEEK:
Write down your two upgrades and the name of your guarantee. Run your real cost numbers, then fill in the highlighted parts of the letter above. Schedule it to go out by November 15, so customers get six weeks' notice before January 1.
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Inside Profit Academy, we build the upgrade list and the full letter tuned to your trade and your prices, plus a plethora of other profit-producing goodness. The newsletter teaches the move. Profit Academy builds it.
FREE FOR BRAIN MONEY READERS Find the hidden revenue already sitting in your business Price is one of four levers: Frequency, Referrals, Average Ticket and Price. Most owners pull one of them hard and ignore the other three. The free Hidden Revenue Assessment shows you where the money is hiding in YOUR business, so you know exactly where to start. Take it before you set your 2027 prices. It'll tell you whether price is really your biggest opportunity or just the most obvious one. |
Talk soon,
David
P.S. Timing matters here. Send this after Thanksgiving and your notice lands in the middle of the holidays with barely a month to go before January 1. Write it this week and schedule it for November 15. P.P.S. Want more moves like this one? Grab the free 7 Secrets to Double Profits guide here.
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