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Key takeaways

• According to a 2025 survey of 300 manufacturing and distribution executives, 99% of companies adjusted prices in response to economic volatility, but only about half reported strong confidence in their visibility into the margin impact of those decisions.
• Though external pressures are often cited, internal structural flaws primarily drive margin bleed in manufacturing. Survey data indicates that pricing wars, uncoordinated decision-making, and inconsistent discounting and governance are the leading causes.
• When pricing accountability sits at the executive level without supporting governance infrastructure, leaders become responsible for outcomes they can only partially influence.

The majority of food manufacturing professionals have been experiencing cost increases. And nearly every manufacturer is adjusting prices in response. 

But many executives are unsure whether those adjustments are working.

A new executive survey by Zilliant found that 99% of manufacturing and distribution companies adjusted prices in response to economic volatility. When material, labor, and logistics costs all climb at once, pricing is one of the few variables companies can move.

However, only about half of leaders are highly confident in their understanding of how those pricing decisions affect margins, and 61% of organizations have been reworking pricing three to four or more times per year.

That’s a lot of activity without much certainty of the impact. 

Most unnoticed margin loss comes from internal sources

When margin pressure comes up in executive conversations, external forces like competitive pricing, raw material volatility, and tariff exposure tend to steal the focus. But survey respondents also noted several sources within their organizations:

• A lack of discounting consistency (34%)
• A lack of consistency in governance (29%)
• Fragmented and isolated decision-making processes (27%)
• Pricing overrides (22%)

All four appear in organizations where pricing decisions are distributed across teams, tools, and workflows that aren’t fully coordinated. Executives can often identify where margin is draining. The harder question is whether the right governance is in place to address it consistently, across every channel, facility, and team that touches a pricing decision.

Pricing accountability at the executive level requires matching infrastructure

Pricing ownership has shifted to the executive level in 88% of organizations, with CEOs, CFOs, and chief revenue officers now bearing primary responsibility for pricing results. That reflects how directly pricing now affects financial performance, customer retention, and quarterly results. It belongs at that level.

But while responsibility has moved upward, execution infrastructure hasn’t necessarily followed. Most organizations still rely on a fragmented mix of tools. Roughly 24% use internally built pricing systems, 23% use AI-enabled solutions, 20% use non-AI vendor tools, and 18% still rely on spreadsheets.

Without a unified system of record, pricing decisions vary by team and facility. Governance weakens. Leadership is accountable for pricing outcomes without full control over how they’re created. Maintaining this stance becomes increasingly complex as the frequency of price adjustments rises and financial constraints persist.

How to start building pricing governance that sticks

1. Reduce exposure by closing critical control gaps first, rather than overhauling your entire infrastructure.
2. Pinpoint where pricing decisions truly occur, including discounting discretion and override approvals, at both facility and corporate levels.
3. Identify your primary source of inconsistency, such as varied discounting authority or inter-site pricing fluctuations, and establish governance there.
4. Define decision ownership and approval processes.
5. Cultivate a shared view of pricing and margin impact. 

Since 61% of organizations rework pricing at least three times annually, a consistent review process is essential to turn these cycles into better margin control.

Pricing has become a board-level concern in food manufacturing for reasons that are unlikely to ease. The risk it introduces, though, is largely structural. That makes it responsive to structural fixes. Governance, visibility, and consistent execution matter more than pricing frequency.

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