Red-Gate Sql Refactor is great! Pricing - not so much.

I installed Red-Gate’s Sql Refactor addin when the beta first came out and instantly loved it!  The features were perfect; the automatic code-formatting, smart renaming, configurable sql coding style preferences, not to mention all of the DDL refactoring tools.

It finally made Microsoft’s Sql Server Management Studio [almost] everything it SHOULD have been.   A while back, I noticed that my install had quit working, so I visited their website today to check for an update.  Sweet! The product is no longer in beta.

In fact, it now has a great new price of $295!!!

Well, I mean “Great” as-in;

• This is the greatest marketing mistake I have seen in a while.
  
• There will be “great” demand for this download on BitTorrent.
• Great product, not-so-great price.
• Wow!  Red-gate will now make thousands of $$ instead of millions! Great idea!
• My desire to laugh is greater than my desire to buy.

Come on guys!  As great the features are in Sql Refactor, it’s still a freakin add-in.   Furthermore, its an add-in for a 3^rd rate (being generous) Sql query tool.   This is Marketing 101 – price high, sell few; price low, sell many.  

The product has a potentially large target market, including every single Sql Server 2005 DBA and developer, so it could succeed if marketed with pricing that matches this potential volume.  The good news is that Red-Gate produced an excellent tool, and realizes its value to developers and DBA alike.  The bad news is that they seem to have seen the $$ and got greedy. 

So, a tip-of-the-hat to the  Red-Gate developers, but a wag-of-the-finger to  Red-Gate marketeers.