The cost of not deciding I watched someone run a product line for three years past its expiry date. A physical product, decent margins on paper, but it ate 40% of their attention for 12% of their revenue. When we finally mapped the real numbers, the line had cost them £180,000 in opportunity cost. Not losses on the line itself. Lost growth elsewhere. This happens constantly. People get attached. The product was there at the start. It still sells a bit. Customers still ask for it. So it stays. But staying is a decision too. And most people never make it deliberately. Why this is hard Exiting a product line feels like admitting failure. You launched it. You told people about it. Maybe you have stock. Maybe you have customers who only buy that thing. There is also a sunk cost problem. You have already invested time, money, energy. Walking away means writing that off. But here is the thing: you have already written it off. The question is whether you keep spending more. Sainsbury's just agreed to sell Argos for £120m. That is a £1.4 billion write-down from what they paid in 2016. Painful, yes. But the alternative was continuing to absorb the drag. Sometimes the smartest move is taking the hit and moving on. The signs a product line needs review Not every underperformer should be cut. Some products need repositioning, better marketing, or a price adjustment. The question is whether you have genuinely tested those options or just hoped they would work. Here are the signals I look for: Revenue declining for three consecutive quarters. One bad quarter is noise. Two is a trend. Three means something structural has changed. Margin compression with no path back. If your costs are rising and you cannot pass them to customers, the maths does not get better. UK vegetable growers are facing this right now: drought and heat have crushed yields, wholesale prices are rocketing, and some operations simply cannot make the numbers work anymore. Disproportionate attention drain. The product takes 30% of your time but generates 8% of profit. That ratio matters more than absolute numbers. Customer base shrinking or shifting. If the people who want this thing are disappearing, no amount of marketing fixes it. You dread dealing with it. This one sounds soft, but it matters. If you avoid thinking about a product line, there is usually a reason. How a Decision Matrix helps A Decision Matrix forces you to score options against criteria that actually matter to your business. Not gut feel. Not attachment. Weighted factors. I use one with clients when they are stuck between "keep investing", "maintain and harvest", or "exit". The criteria I typically include: Current profitability (weighted heavily) Trend direction over 12 months Attention required relative to return Strategic fit with where the business is heading Exit complexity (stock, contracts, customer dependencies) Opportunity cost of the resources it consumes You score each option against each criterion, apply the weights, and get a number. The number is not the answer. But it forces the conversation into specifics. The Decision Matrix tool at alira.london lets you build this out properly. Set your own criteria, adjust weights based on what matters most to your situation, and see where the scores land. I have used it with people who were convinced they should keep a line, only to watch their own scoring tell them the opposite. The exit options Exiting does not always mean killing. You have choices: Sell the line. If it has customers and some margin, someone else might want it. They might have lower overheads or a different strategy. Wind down gradually. Stop marketing, let inventory deplete, honour existing customers but take no new orders. This is often the cleanest path for service businesses. Kill immediately. Sometimes the line is actively losing money and the fastest exit is the cheapest. Rip the plaster off. License or white-label. If the product has value but you lack the energy to run it, someone else might pay for the right to do so. Each option has different implications for cash, time, and relationships. The Decision Matrix helps here too: score each exit route against your priorities. What most people get wrong They wait for certainty. They want to be absolutely sure before making the call. Certainty does not arrive. You make the best decision with the information you have, then you move. Waiting another six months rarely produces new insight. It just produces more sunk cost. The other mistake is not separating the product from the identity. I have seen people keep lines running because "we are a company that does X". But you are not. You are a company that does whatever makes sense. The product is not you. Running the analysis yourself This is not complicated. You need a quiet hour, your actual numbers, and honesty. Pull the revenue and margin data for the last 12 months. Calculate the percentage of your time the line consumes. Ask yourself: if you did not already have this product, would you launch it today? If the answer is no, you have your signal. Then build the matrix. The tool at alira.london walks you through it, but you can do it in a spreadsheet if you prefer. The point is making the decision explicit rather than letting it drift. What to do this week List every product or service line you currently offer. Write down last quarter's revenue and rough margin for each. This takes 20 minutes with your accounts open. Identify the one that drains the most attention relative to return. You already know which one it is. Put it on paper. Build a Decision Matrix for that line using alira.london. Score "keep investing", "maintain and harvest", and "exit" against five criteria that matter to you. See what the numbers say. Then decide.