price umbrella

The niche value airlines have been able to come under that pricing umbrella.

"It's more about staving off share erosion from private labels, and dealing with a pricing umbrella that got a little too high."

The cellular industry price umbrella would collapse under the increased competition of as many as seven new personal communications service providers.

"That left a price umbrella open for the private brands," Mr. Stahl said.

Cartels can generate a price umbrella effect, enabling less efficient rivals to charge higher prices than they might otherwise be able to.

He went on, "There will be a pricing umbrella for AirTran to operate under and continue to grow."

As a result, the company itself might thrive under the price umbrella set by the dominant Japanese companies - but it would have failed in its grander strategic mission.

"Protectionism and the decline of the dollar are creating a price umbrella for the auto industry," says David Shulman, chief equity strategist at Salomon Brothers.

A company cannot keep its profits high by delaying expansion unless it can stop all of its other competitors from expanding under the price umbrella it holds over them.

Apple has been very aggressive in price/performance on the iPad (at the low end) and it seems they want to avoid giving any room to competing full-feature tablets under their price umbrella.

They pointed out, for instance, that Honda and Kawasaki, which have established American assembly operations to avoid the tariffs, have been able to find shelter under the same price umbrella that protected Harley.

"Ten years ago, you had to have a price umbrella so everyone could live in the market," said William McCracken, general manager of PC sales at I.B.M. "Today, everyone has to compete on their own price efficiency."

A price umbrella, also known as the umbrella effect, is a pricing effect often created by a dominant company, in which competing firms can find buyers as long as they set their price at or below the level of the dominant one.