✴️ Steal Jason’s trick to make your products feel more affordable

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Hello there 👋

If you haven't checked out last week's email yet, you'll have missed that two themes have been cropping up across all of the projects we've worked on in the last few months:

Price sensitivity (AKA, customers feel it’s “too expensive” or they can’t see why it’s worth more than the alternatives, so they wait for a discount)
A lack of clarity about messaging and voice (AKA, the site, socials and emails feel like they're all saying slightly different things, so it's hard to “get” what makes the brand so awesome)

So for the next few weeks, we're going to be digging into copywriting, messaging and brand voice tricks and tips that can help you make sure your copy makes it immediately clear why your products are awesome and why they're worth the money.

Last week, we looked at how Bold Bean Co use clever messaging to make us happy to pay over 3X more for beans. (And managed to dig up some of their old copy that didn't manage to do this to see how far they've come.)

This week, we're looking at how Jason's Sourdough does some clever messaging judo not only to make us want to spend more on bread but to feel like we're getting a bargain at the same time.

It's really clever stuff.

(Side note: Bold Bean then Jason's. Can you tell we were hungry when we did our content planning for January?)

💡 Our brains judge whether something feels expensive or "just right" by comparing it to similar products. And your messaging can decide what those similar products are.

Imagine your office coffee machine has broken and you're desperate for an afternoon coffee.

The queue at the coffee shop is out of the door and you've got 5 minutes to grab some coffee, get back and make your 3pm meeting.

So you settle for *whisper it* instant coffee.

You're in the supermarket now and you've narrowed it down to two options.

On the packet, one says this: "This roast coffee blend has a delicate, balanced, and aromatic taste. Made with Colombian Arabica beans, it has a fruity and multidimensional character. You'll be surprised by the fruity and balanced taste of this soluble instant coffee."

The other says: "Barista-quality coffee, without the queue. Made with 100% Arabica beans sourced from high-altitude farms for a naturally sweet, balanced flavour. Just add hot water for a smooth, barista-style cup in under 2 minutes. Misspelling your own name on the cup completely optional."

Both are about £6.50 for a jar.

Which one feels like better value for money on a gut level?

It’s Option B, right?

That's because one of the things the messaging subtly changes is the product you compare it to when you think "is £6.50 a fair price for this?"

£6.50 for instant coffee? That's quite expensive.

£6.50 for barista-quality coffee? That's about right.

(Side note: We didn't make up the Option A copy as a straw man. It's a legit coffee product description from a MASSIVE coffee brand. "Surprised by... this soluble instant coffee"? Mmmm... how appetising. We love being surprised that something is actually nice.)

And under the hood, there's a lot of consumer psychology going on to nudge you towards that decision, too:

👉 We judge price fairness through comparing to other products: the way we make pricing decisions is to have an internal “normal price” for a category, and to judge it as fair vs the other kinds of products in its category. That's why Option 1 feels like an expensive instant coffee, but Option 2 feels about right because it's "proper coffee".
👉 Once you've changed the comparison point, the idea of fair shifts: studies have repeatedly found that opinions on pricing can change from "that feels expensive” into "that feels fair for what it is" just by changing the framing around what products we mentally compare it to.

👉 Option B shows their effort, too. We talked about this last week with Bold Bean, but the high-altitude farms" line and the barista-angle not only make the product feel more valuable, but it feels more like a guarantee of quality too. In fact, it makes Option 1 feel more like a risk.

And these clever little bits of consumer psychology are all tricks that Jason's Sourdough have used to get people in the UK not only to spend more on bread but to make a habit of spending more on bread every day.

It's wicked smaht.

And it's all stuff you can use for your brand, too.

Let's dig into it 👇

How Jason's uses clever messaging tricks to sell 1 million loaves a week.

If there's ever a product that can demonstrate the massive difference that messaging can make to price sensitivity, it's packaged bread.

Why? Because most of us buy the same bread on autopilot.

So just getting people to consider switching bread brands is no small feat.

But to get people to spend more money on bread and then make that bread their new daily bread? That takes some real skills.

And Jason's have got skills and then some.

Despite only launching in supermarkets 5 years ago, they’re now the UK's #1 sourdough brand and the 4th biggest bread brand in the UK, selling around 1 million loaves a week, being stocked in nearly 3,000 supermarkets, and stacking up an eye-popping 132% YOY growth.

And almost all of the clever messaging tricks and techniques are on display in this note-perfect 30 second ad they ran last year 👇

Now, a lot of the stuff going on in this ad that makes them feel primo yet affordable is the same effort heuristic stuff we talked about with Bold Bean last week:

They position the product as the result of a singularly obsessed founder
They talk about the process and the pride they take making it
They talk about how it takes 24 hours to make a loaf (creating a comparison with ultra-processed bread)
They make the product feel like it's handmade and that lots of love is put into every loaf

But while Bold Bean compare themselves to cheaper beans ("Bog standard supermarket beans are heated up quickly, to a SUPER high temp, losing the banging beany flavour along the way."), Jason's does the opposite.

It compares itself to better bread. To "proper sourdough".

So that buying it feels like you're getting really good, bakery-quality bread for just a bit more than your regular bread. And that feels like a bargain.

How they use copy to turn “proper sourdough” into an “everyday obsession” not a one-off treat

We talked a few weeks ago about having phrases in your brand language that you can come back to time and time again to drive home your key messaging.

(We call these distinctive voice assets. Which is a horrible term, we know.)

With Goodrays, those phrases were all about the power of calm. For Bold Bean, they were all about obsession with beans.

And for Jason's, they have two yin and yang messages of “proper sourdough” and “everyday obsession”.

And those two phrases are constantly used to balance each other out so that Jason's bread feels both like a premium product and a product you can enjoy every day.

For starters, phrase proper sourdough is doing so much the heavy lifting to make the bread feel premium and fancy and worth spending more on. They're using the language of bakeries and artisan bakers to make their bread feel the same as the loaves you'd get from the bakery.

they talk about ingredients transparently (which also helps with price perception)
they talk about their process
they talk about their 45-year-old mother culture (which they've called Sidney)
they say how each loaf takes 24 hours to make

And it all comes back to one big, clear, gut-level idea that "this proper sourdough" and buying it (instead of the bakery sourdough) isn't a compromise.

But the really clever thing they're also doing is changing that mental price comparison in our heads.

Whenever Jason's says anything about their bread using their artisan-slash-baker language, we're no longer comparing their more expensive loaf against a cheap white loaf in our heads.

We're comparing it to the £3.50 freshly baked loaves from the bakery.

And as a result, it feels both premium and like it's a bit of a bargain.

And it makes it an obvious, easy upgrade from your standard packaged loaf.

That's wicked smaht.

(Especially as Capgemini found that 7 in 10 consumers are spending less but still buying one or two "treat yourself" luxury items as a pick-me-up.)

However, in isolation, this "proper sourdough" messaging is risky.

By leaning into only luxury language, Jason's would risk making their bread sound like an every now and again loaf.

All the talk of ingredients and "proper sourdough" and mothers... is the kind of language used to describe bread you grab for weekend brunches or when you've got guests over and you want to look fancy.

So, to balance that out, Jason's introduce this secondary messaging idea of everyday obsession.

And with those two magic words, they turn the messaging from something that feels like a weekend treat into a replacement for your Hovis or Warburtons.

It gives the customers permission to enjoy it every day. It normalises swapping out your weekday loaf. And it primes you to think "yeah, my sandwich bread isn't real bread, but Jason's is".

It's really clever.

Plus, it doesn't hurt that it lends itself really well to having some fun with their copy, too.

☝️ Joe loves a good pun, so he was a big fan of this.

👋 The other really smart move: this messaging plays into the compromise effect

Jason's clever positioning as "better than the packaged bread, cheaper than the bakery and the best of both worlds" also sets them up perfectly for the compromise effect (sometimes called extremeness aversion) which is when people see a cheap/basic option and a fancy/pricey option, the middle choice often feels like the safe sensible choice.

Steal Jason's big messaging trick for your brand: make your product feel like an affordable version of something more expensive

Alas, studies have shown that customers tend to anchor their idea of a “normal” price to the cheapest option they already know.

After that, everything else feels expensive by comparison.

So if you're selling something that's made in small batches or you're an independent brand without economy of scale on your side or you just use better ingredients that cost a bit more... then your messaging has to work a little harder to make people comfortable spending with you.

👋 Editor's note:

We're aware that this email is starting to feel a little bit like "words are the only thing you need to focus on to fix price sensitivity".

That's obviously not the case.

Product, pricing architecture, offers, and distribution all play a huge (and arguably bigger) role than messaging. We’re just zooming in on messaging because a) its often overlooked as part of the price conversation and b) you can start tackling it this week without spending hours with the CFO going over pricing strategy.

"If you don't like what they're paying, change the conversation"

Whenever a client talks to us about price sensitivity, our first port of call is to take a look at how they're positioning their products.

Does the language feel like it doesn't match the price point on a gut level?

So head to your site and take a look at your product descriptions and all the language that lives at a product level. (Packaging copy, PDP copy, etc...)

Ask yourself, if you took away your branding and brand name, would it sound like the cheap version of your category or the expensive version?

☝️ That's the easiest way to get a quick gut-check on whether your customers are comparing up or down.

As a quick example, let's take another look at this RockFace ad👇

Most deodorant brands would say "do more" or "tough on sweat" and show images of people playing tennis or running or hitting the gym.

Rockface don't do that at all. They focus on smell, scent and feeling good.

And by doing that (and parodying Dior's Sauvage campaign) they move their messaging to framing and language more commonly associated with expensive perfume brands.

👉 Suddenly they’re not competing with Lynx Africa anymore. They’re an affordable daily alternative to a £60+ bottle of cologne. Smart.

👉 Their products feel premium and high-end (AKA, worth more money) without ever saying “premium”. Double smart.

And that's the lesson you can steal from Jason's and RockFace: you can change how much feels fair for your product by changing the way you frame the product, its role in their lives or what it says about their identity.

(This is kinda Jobs to be Done 101 AKA the idea that people don’t buy products for what they are… they “hire” them to do a job in a specific situation.)

Here's one more example from Citizens of Soil 👇

They're not talking about their olive oil like a commodity. There's no "perfect for dipping, drizzling and marinating". They talk about their olive oil like a wine. There's taste profiles and recipes for finishing vanilla ice cream with olive oil...

From messaging alone, we know this isn't a cheap supermarket olive oil. This is olive oil that is about making food taste good, for starters. But it's more than that too. It's olive oil that's playing into how customers feel about themselves when they buy it.

It's olive oil that lets customers say "I'm a proper foodie".

And suddenly, just from the way they've framed their product, we're not mentally comparing it with cheap olive oil anymore.

It has a completely new job in our lives: making us feel like pro chefs.

(Which is super smart, because we know people are willing to pay more for products that are tied to their sense of self.)

So take a look at your category and ask:

What’s the job that people buy the cheaper versions of our product for? (It's most likely something practical and utilitarian.)
What’s the better job we want to own instead? What is our customer really buying for? (Think identity, ritual, reassurance, small indulgence, confidence… use the ladder of why technique we spoke about last year.)
What do we do that puts us in the premium category? (Ingredients, process, constraints, standards, results, history, heritage, tradition...)
How do the premium brands talk about their products? How do they frame their role in their customers lives? (Do they talk about utility? Or feeling? Or vibe? Or identity?)
Are there any other categories we can steal from? (For example, Citizens of Soil steal from wine language, RockFace steal fragrance... are there any analogous brands you can crib inspiration from?)

And then, when you have answers to those, it becomes so much easier to start painting a completely different picture of your product and its value, making customers less likely to question your price point.

Putting it into action

Those questions are all well and good, but how do you turn those answers into copy?

Let's have a look. Say we've just been briefed to work on a new product description for the most commodity of all commodity products, a lunchbox.

This lunchbox sells for £15, but customers in reviews and on social media are comparing it to the £5 lunchboxes you can grab in home departments. As a result, it feels expensive.

However, the lunchbox has features that make it closer to an £80 Yeti lunchbox. (Insulation, compartment for ice packs/heat packs, etc...)

The original product description reads like this:

A reliable lunchbox for meals on the go.
This lightweight, food-safe lunchbox keeps your lunch packed neatly and ready for work, school, or days out. With a secure clip-shut lid and a roomy main compartment, it’s ideal for sandwiches, snacks, fruit, and whatever else you’re bringing along. Dishwasher-safe, microwave-safe and BPA-free.

That feels like a £5 lunchbox, right? There's nothing in there that helps you justify the extra money.

So let's look at the more expensive brands and see what they're doing. They're talking about the technology, they're talking about scenarios, they're making it feel almost outdoorsy and rugged.

So if we take that as our starting point, we get something like this:

The lunchbox built for long days, big adventures, and no soggy surprises.

This isn’t your average, breaks-after-a-few-weeks lunchbox. We spent 2 years designing a proper bit of lunchtime kit that keeps your food fresh and in one piece whether you’re heading into the office, out on a hike, or packing for kids that treat the school run like a full contact sport.

The double-walled build helps maintain temperature for longer and there's space to add ice packs or heat packs, because nobody likes a room temp BLT. There’s also separate sections to keep snacks, mains and treats, so you're not wiping banana off of your crisps as you dash between meetings.

And, of course, it's food-safe, BPA-free, dishwasher-safe and microwave-safe.

See how Option 2 makes £15 feel like a totally fair price for the lunchbox?

That’s not because we sprinkled in a few adjectives. It’s because we changed the product we're comparing it to in our heads.

Option 1 is functionally pretty decent copy, but frames it like just a basic lunchbox. So your brain naturally compares it to the £5 one from the supermarket and thinks "why should I spend the extra tenner?"

Option 2 borrows its framing and language from brands like Patagonia, Yeti, North Face. The mental comparison when we're reading feels more like a piece of hiking gear or some technical clothing than it does a lunchbox.

And that means that suddenly £15 feels like a bargain compared to the £80 Yeti lunchbox stuff and a sensible upgrade from the £5 lunchbox.

And all we've done to get there is magpie the best ideas from the brands we’ve looked at today:

Jason’s: we make it feel like a "proper" lunchbox with quality signals and calling it a "bit of kit". But we kept the voice chatty and talked about the school runs etc... so it didn't start to feel too premium.
RockFace: we borrowed framing from a more premium category (outdoor gear) so it felt more like technical gear rather than a plastic lunchbox.
Citizens of Soil: we leaned into the customers' identity in a subtle way. Under the surface of the description is this idea that buying it signifies “I’m the kind of person who’s on top of things.”
Bold Bean: finally, we back it all up with tangible proof cues (double-walled build, ice/heat packs, compartments) and effort signals (2 years of designing) to underline the value.

But, crucially, we also don't lose the hygiene factors of the cheaper version.

We keep the BPA-free, dishwasher/microwave-safe notes because we know that if we remove those hygiene factors, customers won't even consider us in the first place.

Essentially, it all boils down to this 👇

You don't have to try harder to convince people your product is worth more, you just have to use language to shift the products they're comparing it to.

That way, you're seen as a sensible upgrade to cheaper brands and a more affordable version of more expensive brands.

Super smart.

Want to dial up your copy & messaging in 2026?

If you're in a place where it feels like you've built an awesome brand with great products, 5* reviews and you're gaining momentum... but your messaging and copy feels like it’s holding you back, we'd love to help.

We love nothing more than rolling up our sleeves and helping ambitious brands get crystal clear on their messaging, lock in their brand voice (so the whole team can write and stay on-brand) and turn it all into customer-winning copy across everything from PDPs to emails to retail decks.

Want to have a no-pressure, no-BS chat about how we can help?

Grab 30-mins on our calendar here 👇

Let's chat!

(Pssst. Last week the team at Nursem said this about us: "Jack and Joe were mind readers. They quickly spotted the real customer pain points and reshaped the page in a way that was clear, focused and exactly what we’d hoped for." The Derren Browns of the copy world? We'll take that.)

Peace and love ✌️

Jack and Joe

co-founders, co-brothers & co-pywriters
at Do Words Good

PS. Want to do words even gooder? Let's chat 👇

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