Free calculator · no signup
How many customers can you lose if you raise your prices, and still make the same profit? Put in four numbers. Everything is worked out in your browser — nothing is sent or stored.
Per visit, job, order or subscription.
Materials, product, card fees, commission — costs that go away if the sale does.
At a 40% margin, a 10% rise lets you lose up to 20% of customers — 24 of 120 a month — and still make the same profit. If fewer than 24 leave, you come out ahead by up to $960 a month.
| Lose | Customers | Profit / mo | vs now |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0% | 120 | $4,800 | +$960 |
| 5% | 114 | $4,560 | +$720 |
| 10% | 108 | $4,320 | +$480 |
| 20% | 96 | $3,840 | same |
Profit here is gross profit: price minus variable cost. Fixed costs (rent, salaries, software) are the same before and after, so they do not change the break-even.
The arithmetic
The usual guess is that a 10% rise survives losing 10% of customers. It survives far more, because the whole rise lands on profit. Take an $80 job with $48 of variable cost: a 40% margin, $32 profit a sale. At $88 the profit per sale is $40 — a 10% rise in price is a 25% rise in profit. With 120 customers a month, profit goes from $3,840 to $4,800, and you would have to lose 24 of them before you were back at $3,840.
The formula is loss = rise ÷ (margin + rise), with both as a share of the old price: 10 ÷ (40 + 10) = 20%, and 20% of 120 is 24.
Your margin decides almost everything. The thinner it is, the more of each sale the rise represents, and the bigger your cushion:
| Gross margin | 5% rise | 10% rise | 20% rise |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20% | 20% | 33.3% | 50% |
| 40% | 11.1% | 20% | 33.3% |
| 60% | 7.7% | 14.3% | 25% |
| 80% | 5.9% | 11.1% | 20% |
Share of customers you can lose and keep the same gross profit.
So a low-margin business — one reselling parts or food — can often afford a rise that looks reckless, and usually needs it most. A high-margin one like consulting or coaching has less room: at 80%, a 10% rise is covered by losing only one customer in nine.
What the calculator cannot tell you is how many will actually leave. That depends on your customers, what the alternatives cost and how you tell them. It also assumes the people who leave are average; if your biggest accounts go, the damage is larger. Treat the break-even as the ceiling, then give customers a reason, not just a number.
A price rise is one move
Describe your business in a sentence and get three specific moves back — a price rise, a service plan, the work you are underquoting — each priced per month with the arithmetic written out, like the table above.
Want all ten moves, the 90-day order and a letter written for you? The Profit Leak Audit is $49 once.
Divide the rise by your margin plus the rise, with both as a share of the old price. At a 40% gross margin, a 10% rise lets you lose 10 ÷ (40 + 10) = 20% of customers and still make the same gross profit. Lose fewer than that and you are ahead.
Because the rise is a bigger share of what each sale earns. At a 20% margin a 10% rise lifts profit per sale by half, so you can lose 33% of customers before you are worse off. At an 80% margin the same rise adds an eighth, and the cushion is 11%.
No. Fixed costs are the same before and after the rise, so they cancel out of the comparison. Use only variable costs — materials, product, card fees, commission — that disappear when a sale does. If losing customers would also let you cut staff hours, your true break-even is higher than the calculator shows.
Price minus the variable cost of delivering that sale, divided by price. A $80 job with $48 of parts and card fees has a 40% margin. If you do not know it, use the "$ cost" option and the calculator works it out.
No. It tells you how many you can afford to lose. How many actually leave depends on your customers, your competitors and how you announce it. It also assumes the people who leave are average customers — if your largest accounts leave, the loss is bigger.
Worked out your number? Now write it down.
Price increase letter templatesA calculator, not financial advice. The results are scenarios based on the numbers you enter, not forecasts.