Fable
After the station separated stable fees, mileage fees and urgent letter fees, the caravans stopped arguing over the accounts
The Lingnan post station originally charged only a fixed monthly fee. A caravan could pay one sum and use the stables, change horses, send items and rest. When there were few teams, this approach saved trouble.
As trade routes grew busy, customers became more varied. Small caravans only sent the occasional letter, large caravans changed horses daily, pharmacies often sent urgent dispatches, and cloth merchants occupied warehouses for long periods. A flat monthly fee made light customers feel overcharged and let heavy customers run the relay station into overdraft.
The stationmaster first changed to charging by headcount. The large caravans immediately complained: many people does not mean many horses used; the apothecary had few people, yet always needed urgent midnight deliveries. The bill and the real value were still misaligned.
He then tried a pure mileage fee. As a result, customers stretched urgent shipments into regular ones to save money, no one paid for warehouse occupancy, and the relay station still had to keep horses, staff, and roads maintained. Charging by a single yardstick cannot cover multiple costs.
On a snowy day, three types of customers were jammed at the counter at the same time. The stationmaster finally laid out the ledger: some costs came from long-term available stables, some from actual mileage run, some from expedited support, and some from dedicated concierge-style service.
The new price list is divided into four tiers: a base membership fee guarantees the stable and system availability; a mileage fee is charged by actual transport; an urgent fee covers priority dispatch; and large clients sign separately for warehousing and dedicated service packages. Each tier has corresponding costs and value.
Customers initially found it complicated, but later argued less. Small caravans entered at a low threshold, large caravans paid by scale, the apothecary paid for certainty, and the cloth merchant paid for storage occupancy. The post station could also see which tier lifted gross margin and which tier merely consumed resources.
Hybrid pricing is not about making the price list thicker, but about acknowledging that a service often contains fixed capability, variable usage, outcome commitments, and human service at the same time. Only by separating these layers does a supplier have a chance to make customers feel it is fair while protecting its own gross margin. The station master also regularly reviewed the books for each layer: which layer customers were willing to pay for certainty, and which layer was merely consuming resources. Once prices were separated, the station knew whether to expand the stables or limit urgent deliveries. Later, customer negotiations also became concrete. If you want to pay less in base fees, you cannot demand horses available at any time; if you want urgent delivery guarantees, you have to pay for standby staff. Price finally aligned with promise.