Had an interesting discussion with a SaaS CEO on who should own pricing. He leaned toward the product organisation with the belief pricing is a feature.

I argued that pricing isn’t a feature. It’s your strategy made visible.

I've watched pricing bounce between departments like a hot potato for 20+ years. Product says it's about features. We, Marketing, claim it's about positioning. Finance insists it's about margins. We're all wrong. And yet we're all right.

At Adobe, pricing lived with Product. Made sense - they understood the value stack. But they missed market dynamics.

At VMware, Finance owned it. Great for protecting margins. Terrible for competitive agility.

At a scale-up, Marketing ran pricing. We could move fast, test boldly. But sometimes forgot the unit economics.

That’s why in each company we learned: the best pricing doesn't live in any one department. It lives at the intersection. Pricing is a three-legged stool:

Product knows what it costs to build and deliver
Marketing understands what customers will pay
Finance ensures you don't go broke being clever

Kill any leg, the whole thing collapses.

The companies that win? They create pricing councils. Cross-functional teams that meet weekly. Equal voices. Shared accountability. Because here's the thing: Your pricing IS your strategy. It signals who you serve, what you value, where you're headed.

Slack didn't win on features. They won on pricing that made sense - pay for active users only. That wasn't a Product decision or a Finance mandate. That was strategic thinking.

So stop asking where pricing should sit. Start asking who's at the pricing table. Of course, the challenge for marketing right now is it’s not even being considered for a seat (a topic for another day!)

And no, pricing isn't a feature. It's the most honest expression of your company's confidence in its own value. Get it wrong, and no amount of great marketing or product innovation will save you.