1. Client Overview

• Industry: Industrial and Refinish Coatings – OEM, Refinish, and Commercial Vehicle
• Business Size: Global operations with regional manufacturing and distribution hubs across APAC, EMEA, and the Americas
• Client Context:
  Axalta serves OEMs, body shops, distributors, and industrial manufacturers with high-performance coatings, systems, and accessories. The organisation had grown through acquisitions and regional expansion, but pricing execution was fragmented, discounting practices varied by territory, and margin leakage was hidden within complex rebate, transfer pricing, and distribution structures.

2. Challenge / Problem

• Symptoms Observed:
  
  • Country managers and sales leaders applied different pricing logic, from strict list adherence to aggressive localised discounting
  • Trade programs and rebates were inconsistently applied or poorly tracked, especially at sub-dealer and workshop levels
  • Sales teams lacked visibility into margin impact of override discounts or deal-specific bundles (e.g., free tinting, accessories)
  • Internal knowledge gaps on pricing maths, contribution margin, and elasticity-based pricing decisions
• Strategic Impact:
  
  • Regional pricing inconsistency eroded brand trust and channel discipline
  • Margin compression in high-volume SKUs due to cost-plus pricing and competitive match-downs
  • Over-reliance on discounts to defend share, rather than monetising technical support, product performance, or service capability
• Internal Viewpoint:

“We’re leaving margin on the table. Pricing decisions are being made by gut feel, and no one knows how much support or discounting is too much—or too little.”

3. Objectives of the Engagement

• Identify and quantify margin leakage across key markets (India, Australia, Southeast Asia)
• Establish a unified pricing capability framework and maturity baseline
• Build internal confidence and control in pricing decisions, reducing override dependency
• Align sales teams to a structured pricing approach across commercial and refinish channels
• Develop tools and training to improve technical pricing fluency, value selling, and rebate governance

4. Our Approach

• Phase 1: Capability Diagnostic
  
  • Over 40 managers and frontline leaders completed a pricing capability diagnostic survey across APAC
  • Scored key capabilities across pricing strategy, quote governance, margin visibility, customer segmentation, and discount execution
  • Established a maturity baseline: Australia scored highest (94.5%), India showed deeper gaps with mixed ratings (mid-60s to low 80s)
• Phase 2: Root Cause & Action Planning
  
  • Facilitated regional insight sessions to discuss inconsistent deal practices, tools, and pricing delegation logic
  • Identified urgent improvement areas: customer tiering, localised rebate design, and contribution margin modelling
• Phase 3: Execution Toolkit & Education
  
  • Delivered training workshops on pricing mechanics, cost/margin impact of discounts, and value quantification
  • Developed SOPs for discount approvals, dealer rebates, and bundled product pricing
  • Initiated roadmap for building pricing governance into CRM and ERP quoting flows

5. Key Actions Taken

6. Results Achieved (Within 12 Weeks)

7. Client Feedback

“We had pricing knowledge in pockets, but no structure. Now we have a playbook, a shared language, and real discipline in our deals. That’s the real value.”
— Regional Business Director, South Asia, Axalta Coatings Systems

8. What This Means for Similar Companies

In industrial coatings, price erosion often hides behind channel rebates, legacy discount structures, and product bundling. Without pricing governance, even premium brands struggle to defend margin. Axalta’s case shows how regional sales teams can shift from reactive pricing to value-based growth—when backed by education, data, and role clarity.

9. Contact Us

To explore how your industrial or coatings business could recover margin and build global pricing discipline across complex product-service bundles, contact:

Ron Wood