How often are customers really given that choice, as opposed to companies making the decision on their behalf because customers are stupid (they just want a better horse after all).
> How often are customers really given that choice?
You and your competition produce two equivalent products. They sell theirs for $100: do you feel confident in pricing yours at $110 and base your commercial copy on "We rely on a more robust logistic chain in case of a world-wide catastrophe"?
This isn't asking the customer to make a choice, it's asking a businessman if they're willing to invest in their business.
And it is an investment, not an ongoing significant cost. Once you have a local surplus established, you can simply buy what you use going forward - the same as any other JIT manufacturing process - with a minimal ongoing cost for storage space.
As such, a businessman who wishes to invest in the in the longevity of the business over maximizing this year's profits would be happy to sacrifice some profit for the ability to remain solvent in the next supply chain breakdown.
The choice is almost always there, but the overwhelming majority of people choose the cheap option. Seriously, for pretty much anything there's a cheap version and a more expensive, (usually) better quality version.
It's the "usually" that's the problem for me. Last time I bought a washing machine I was willing to pay 3x the cost of the cheapest model provided it came with a warrantee that was at least 3 times longer. But in fact all machines had the same pathetic 2-year warrantee, indicating to me the manufacturer didn't genuinely believe their more expensive machine was going to last any longer. So I went for a mid-range one that at least didn't look cheap and nasty, but probably will break down in a few years anyway (and then be more expensive to repair than replace).
We can't buy what doesn't exist after all.