Cheaper Isn't Always Better, But Better Is Always Better

Randy Thompson · August 13, 2026

Randy has a line he makes every agent memorize, and he uses it on every product he sells: “Cheaper isn’t always better, and better isn’t always cheaper — but better is always better.”

It sounds simple until you watch what it does to a conversation. Most people shop on price because they can’t see the difference between the options. “If we make our decision based on price,” Randy warns, “we typically get burned.” The fix isn’t to argue about the number — it’s to make the value impossible to miss, because “we’re always selling solutions to problems, not products and features.”

He tells the story of a customer named Bernie. Bernie put his coverage in place a month or two before turning 65. Three days after it took effect, he had a massive heart attack — collapsed, was life-flighted out, went straight into open-heart surgery, and came out with five stents. The bill came to $2.2 million. His coverage paid all of it but one line item: a vending-machine card the hospital had handed his family for the waiting room.

Bernie had a choice, months earlier, between something cheaper and something better. Cheaper would have looked like the smart call right up until the ambulance showed up. “I love insurance when it takes care of catastrophic problems,” Randy says — and that’s the whole point. The value of “better” only reveals itself on the worst day, which is exactly why you can’t let the best day’s price talk you out of it.

So Randy stops selling features and asks the question that reframes everything: “What do you want your policy to do?” Answer that honestly and price stops being the conversation — worth becomes the conversation.

Whatever you sell, the principle holds. Compete on cheap and you’re always one dollar away from losing the deal. Compete on better, and you become the person people are grateful they didn’t cut corners on.

Want to build a business that wins on value, not price? Coach with Randy.