The wrong pricing method either wastes effort or answers the wrong question. A full conjoint study is more than you need if your product is fixed and you only want a quick price check. And Van Westendorp alone will mislead you if you are pricing a tiered product against three strong competitors, because it ignores both switching and the value of features.
Ordeen runs all of these methods in the same workspace, so we have no reason to push one over another. Three questions decide the choice.
1. Is the product fixed, or are you trading off features, tiers and pack sizes?
One fixed product: you know what you are selling and want to know what to charge. Use Van Westendorp or Gabor-Granger.
Several attributes, tiers or bundles: you want to know what an upgrade is worth, how to set up Good/Better/Best tiers, or how pack size and price interact. Use choice-based conjoint (CBC), adaptive CBC (ACBC) when there are more than seven attributes, or menu-based choice (MBC) when customers pick several items from a menu.
2. Do you already have candidate prices?
No, we need the ballpark: use Van Westendorp. Respondents name their own too cheap, bargain, getting expensive and too expensive prices, which reveals the acceptable price range from scratch.
Yes, we are choosing between specific prices (say £29, £39, £49, £59): use Gabor-Granger. Respondents rate their intent to buy at your exact prices, which shows where demand falls away.
3. Do competitors drive the decision?
Little direct comparison, or an early concept check: Van Westendorp and Gabor-Granger show your product on its own. Both measure stated price resistance, not market share.
A competitive category: raise your price by 15% and some buyers switch to a rival, some trade down to a smaller tier, and some walk away. Only conjoint (CBC, ACBC, MBC) simulates your product against named competitors and the option to buy nothing.
Side by side
Best for
Van Westendorp: Finding the acceptable price range for one product
Gabor-Granger: Testing specific prices for one product
Conjoint (CBC / ACBC): Feature value, tier design and competitive pricing
Menu-based choice: Menus and bundles where buyers pick several items
What respondents see
Van Westendorp: One product description
Gabor-Granger: One product at a series of prices
Conjoint (CBC / ACBC): Competing product profiles, plus "none"
Menu-based choice: A menu of items with prices
Competitors
Van Westendorp: Not shown
Gabor-Granger: Not shown
Conjoint (CBC / ACBC): Shown, with the option to choose none
Menu-based choice: Shown as menu items
How Ordeen analyses it
Van Westendorp: Four curve intersections with 1,000-sample bootstrap intervals; Newton-Miller-Smith demand and revenue
Gabor-Granger: Calibrated intent (0.70 / 0.30) with bootstrap intervals per price
Conjoint (CBC / ACBC): Hierarchical Bayes on a GPU, with intervals from posterior draws
Menu-based choice: Hierarchical Bayes, with a basket simulator
Main outputs
Van Westendorp: Floor, optimal, indifference and ceiling prices; demand and revenue curves
Gabor-Granger: Demand curve, revenue-maximising price, price cliffs, arc elasticity
Conjoint (CBC / ACBC): Share of preference, elasticity and cannibalisation, willingness to pay, TURF
Menu-based choice: Item take-up, basket revenue, substitution between items
What it can't tell you
Van Westendorp: Share lost to particular competitors; the value of individual features
Gabor-Granger: Prices outside your ladder; the value of individual features
Conjoint (CBC / ACBC): Profit (it doesn't know your costs)
Menu-based choice: Single-choice trade-offs, where buyers pick only one item
Survey length depends on the design. Van Westendorp and Gabor-Granger are usually much shorter than conjoint, which asks a series of choice tasks.
Using the methods in sequence
Many teams combine them:
Discovery: a quick Van Westendorp study to find the acceptable range (say £25 to £65) and rule out unrealistic extremes.
Packaging and competition: that range then sets the price ladder for a CBC or ACBC study (or a conditional price table across tiers), to test which features justify a premium and how share holds up against real competitors.
If you upload your brief, Ordeen's assistant recommends one of these methods with its reasoning, and shows the alternatives, before you lock the design.
Related reading: What is the Van Westendorp Price Sensitivity Meter? · What is the Gabor-Granger method? · CBC vs ACBC
Sources
van Westendorp, P. H. (1976). NSS Price Sensitivity Meter (PSM): a new approach to study consumer perception of prices. Proceedings of the ESOMAR Congress, Venice.
Gabor, A., & Granger, C. W. J. (1966). Price as an indicator of quality: report on an enquiry. Economica, 33(129), 43–70.
