Will Companies One Day Use Brain Waves to Find Ideal Pricing?

You’re not paying enough for your coffee. That’s according to Kai-Markus Müller, a German neuroscientist who has developed a way to measure brain waves and hit upon feel-good prices. Judging by neuro-images, he told Spiegel Online International, Germans would happily pay $3.25 for a small cup of Starbucks coffee, 33 percent more than the current price of $2.44. If he’s right, Starbucks is missing out on a whole lot of profit.

Müller previously worked for the consulting firm Simon-Kucher & Partners, helping companies determine optimal pricing for their products. But, he says, “classic market research doesn’t work correctly,” adding that research subjects can’t always be trusted to honestly state how much they’d be willing to pay for something.