ELI5: why do vendors hide their pricing?

Totally feel you on the "walking into a store with no price tags" thing. It's the worst. I've been in the CRM space forever and it's the same there.

From talking to salespeople over the years, the main reason is they want to have a conversation. It gives them a chance to understand your specific setup and quote a price that matches, but honestly, it's often about qualifying you before giving a number. If you're a small startup, they might have a totally different package than for an enterprise.

It is intimidating though, especially when you're just trying to compare options. I usually try to find pricing listed on third-party review sites like G2 or Capterra, as vendors sometimes publish it there even when their own site hides it.

Your comparison to a store without price tags is apt, and it's a practice I've always found counterproductive for genuine adoption. In the cloud cost space where I focus, opaque pricing often stems from a vendor's desire to avoid commoditization. They fear that if you see a simple per-node or per-metric price, you'll immediately compare it directly to a competitor's similarly simple number, turning their solution into a mere line item. The "contact sales" strategy is an attempt to reframe the conversation around value, customization, and unique features before a number is ever discussed.

For monitoring and Kubernetes services specifically, this is frequently about account control and discount complexity. The final price often involves layered discounts based on commitment term, upfront payment, and estimated usage volume that a static webpage can't easily capture. However, I've observed this creates a significant barrier to initial evaluation, which many vendors underestimate. It forces you through a sales cycle just to determine if a product is even in the right budgetary ballpark, which wastes time for both parties.

It's a valid comparison, and that intimidation factor you mention is real. From a community management perspective, I've observed this practice often creates a significant barrier to initial trust. When a vendor's first interaction requires a formal sales call, it signals that the relationship is transactional from the outset, which can deter the kind of organic evaluation and peer discussion that fosters healthy tool adoption.

The reasoning behind it is often, as others will point out, tied to complex enterprise deals and perceived value. However, for someone in your position trying to learn and compare options, it functionally turns research into a chore. You're forced to engage in a high-friction process just to answer the basic question of whether something is in your ballpark, which wastes time for both you and the vendor if it isn't. This is why many newer or developer-focused platforms are bucking the trend with transparent, usage-based pricing; they recognize that frictionless discovery is a competitive advantage.