To complicate matters, suppliers are aware that they
have a broad range of high- and low-demand customers.
For example, high-demand customers might regularly
change delivery schedules, require special treatment,
return goods, or phone the customer service help desk.
Low-demand ones do none of these things. The extra
consumption of expenses from high-demand customers
means they are relatively less profitable than you might
assume from the sales volume of their purchases. What
this means for the marketing and sales functions is that
their objective is no longer solely about increasing market
share and growing sales but about growing profitable
sales. That requires tracing expenses below the product
gross profit margin line, including channel distribution,
selling, marketing, and customer service costs to serve.