Recently, while trying to sort out major issue with a particular service which was caused by RIM's major outage, I negotiated  a trial of a new innovative “make clients and customers lives easy" technology–and I was keen to point out a trial at no cost.

Having achieved that, I said to the supplier “being northern–I love cheap" – to which he replied ‘cheap has no value’. I would of argued the point but felt having achieved so much I didn't want to jeopardise the agreement.

That evening on the way home I reflected over what was meant by value?

By definition (yes I looked this up) value is defined as an amount, as of goods, services, or money, considered to be a fair and suitable equivalent for something else; a fair price or return.

Was I getting value for the service? ... I wanted to roll out the trial without incurring any costs -  yes, I was. But was the supplier getting value? – probably not.

I'd argue that the supplier was gaining value, the trial may have been a loss-leader but if the supplier decided to put the effort in and do all the background work on to ensure the trial was a success then the supplier would of eventually gained some value out of the transaction through sales.

Someone once mentioned to me the scenario of what I call 'the plastic bag' – this is where the customer requires to “tool" to carry items. Everybody has a different perception of value particularly with regard to providing something to carry items around in. Some of us would have something with wheels others would have something we carry; a few would go for a designer bag like Gucci or Ferragamo whereas others may go for a duffel bag or even a plastic bag.

The point I make is that everybody is different, we all want something but generally it differs between each of us. 

Value is exactly the same, as a further analogy the "buy one get one free (BOGOF)" marketing campaign that many shops offer, may provide value to a household that has

 (1) lots of storage space,

 (2) large number of individuals who live together [large family] and

 (3) consume a lot of the product on offer.

Whereas if you live by yourself and don't spend a lot of time at home (out partying a lot), there is no value in BOGOF–you probably tell them to “bog off".

I realise we all are at fault, customers and suppliers – we sometimes don't have the foresight to get the best out of what we want by failing to understanding how we each define value.

Next time you are after something - think about how you both define what value is? you don't need to be northern to appreciate a cheap ...