4 Key Product Mix Elements for Product Demand

Try to think of your favorite brands; you’ll notice that their business isn’t built on a single product. Instead, most companies offer a wide array of products they specialize in making. If you want to start your product line, it’s essential to understand how to use product mix elements. 

This article covers the definition of a product mix, its importance, and its elements. Let’s begin.

What Is a Product Mix?

A product mix represents the different products sold within a company or a market segment. More explicitly, it refers to the various product types that differ in size, style, price, or manufacturer.

A product mix has four elements:

• Width: the total number of product lines in a business.
• Length: the total number of products in the mix. 
• Depth: number of variants of a product line.
• Consistency: the degree each product relates to the other in a product mix.

Why Is It Important?

A product mix is essential in understanding the complete picture of the market and each product type’s effect. It directly affects what consumers buy and the buying patterns that come with it. 

Have you gone to a store only to find that your wanted product isn’t available? It happens partly because there isn’t enough demand for every category of product you could create. 

A product mix balances needed and popular products with less popular and less necessary products. It ensures that a company sells all products and recoups production costs.

Product Mix Vs. Product Line

A product line is a grouping of items that work the same way and share some quality attributes. For instance, the Apple MacBook Pro laptops are part of the same product line. 

A product mix is a grouping of items that share certain qualities but differ in their uses.

4 Key Product Mix Elements

Here are some primary elements of a product mix.

1. Length

Product length includes all related products sold by a single brand. It can also refer to the number of stock-keeping units in a product line. 

For example, Samsung has several products in their Galaxy smartphone product line. 

• S Series and Galaxy Folds for their flagships.
• FE (Fan Edition) series for their mid-range offerings.
• A series for budget-conscious buyers.

A product line is based on the premise that customers are more likely to buy products from a brand they already trust. Therefore, manufacturers introduce various products to capture sales from loyal customers.

2. Width

Product width or breadth refers to the variety of available products your company offers. They can come from different brands. A greater variety of products generally means more significant sales for the retailer. 

For example:

A shoe store may have over two hundred different products from different product lines from performance footwear brands like Nike, Adidas, New Balance, etc.

Retailers often have great product width because they function as one-stop shops. It’s also a way to manage the risk of products becoming obsolete. 

3. Depth

Product depth refers to the variety of a particular product in a line. The primary idea behind product depth is to give consumers options related to the product.

For example:

The iPhone 13 Pro Max comes in a variety of storage options. 

Product depth provides customers with flexible choices that allow them to match the product with their needs. 

4. Consistency

Product consistency refers to using a similar pattern and design for every unit in a product line. It also plays a role in covering a larger market and catering to a broad demographic. 

The more consistent a product line is, its production and marketing will be more cost-effective. Product consistency helps retailers recommend close alternatives for a particular product.

For example:

A retailer can recommend Adidas Solar Boosts to customers when the Adidas Ultraboost is out of stock. They are similar in performance, silhouette, and pricing.

Conclusion

A product mix is a subset of a product line which is a subset of a product family. Products lines by nature will have different features and quality levels, and each level will carry a specific market. To gain a broader market, the creator or creator of the product must create multiple lines which will then create different levels of quality as well.