You’ll recognise the moment.

A new product or service or supplier gets brought into staffroom conversations. It looks promising. People can see how it might help. No one’s questioning whether it’s good.

But the conversation doesn’t stay there for long.

Someone, of course, asks how much it costs. But the conversation is bigger than that. Someone else asks whether it’s worth committing budget to it now, given everything else competing for attention. If another purchase will need to be delayed if this goes ahead. If it’s strong enough to stand up when someone asks why this was prioritised over something else.

Even when competing with tighter budgets, the sheer cost on its own isn’t what decides whether something gets bought or not.

A cheaper option that doesn’t get used, doesn’t deliver, or ends up creating more work quickly becomes a wasted spend. Schools have all been there in some form, which is why those decisions now get picked apart more carefully.

On the other hand, an alternative that’s more expensive can still quite easily get the green light if the impact is proven. Maybe it’s been seen working in another school, or it’s proven to save time or increase learning outcomes, or the school realised they could centralise providers.

So yes, schools need to cut costs - but not at the expense of the quality of their resources.

The context: funding is rising… but it doesn’t feel like it

The Department for Education has confirmed that core school budgets will reach £67 billion in 2026/27, up from £65.3 billion in 2025/26. That’s a 2.6% increase - but with the UK CPI sitting at around 3%, school funding isn’t rising fast enough to outpace inflation, nevermind the rising costs of staffing, energy, and external suppliers.

So while budgets look healthier at a headline level, most schools feel like they have less room to manoeuvre - and our data backs that up. We recently surveyed UK schools, academies, and trusts, who reported…

62% of schools expect their core funding won’t fully cover essential costs, and only 4% say it will comfortably cover them.

It’s easy to see why this’ll have a huge impact on how spending decisions are made. Things that used to be signed off relatively quickly now get discussed, questioned, and revisited. More people get involved, and more justification is needed.

Not because schools are trying to slow things down, but because they can’t afford to get it wrong.

Schools are still buying, just far more selectively

One of the easiest traps to fall into right now is assuming that tighter budgets mean cuts across the board.

And while that’s true to some degree, schools still need to invest. Teachers still need teaching resources, pupils still need interventions, and buildings still need maintenance. In some cases, those needs are becoming more urgent, not less.

Spending has changed, but what’s changed more significantly is how deliberate those decisions are.

In practice, schools are pulling back on things that feel harder to justify or lower impact, while continuing to invest where the benefit is clear and immediate. They’re prioritising decisions that feel low-risk and high-confidence, rather than spreading budget more evenly.

So the question isn’t if schools are buying, but where they’re buying, and what makes something feel worth buying right now.

The upfront cost vs the cost of getting it wrong

In that environment, it’s no surprise that 87% of schools say cost and value for money is the most important factor when choosing suppliers. It’s easy to interpret that as a push towards cheaper options. In reality, cheap often loses.

A lower-cost option that creates additional workload, slows progress compared to alternatives, or requires other tools to fill gaps will lose out to higher-cost alternatives that do deliver.

Most schools will have fallen victim to this before. Budget gets committed to something that looked promising, but never quite delivers in the way it was expected to. It gets used inconsistently, or creates more work than anticipated, or solves part of a problem but leaves other gaps behind.

That isn’t always straightforward to fix; contracts often run for a full year, and budgets don’t usually leave room to ‘just’ buy another. Even when there’s a clear issue, the only real solution is often to continue and try to make it work - and it doesn’t always.

Teachers adapt around something that doesn’t quite fit, which usually means more time, more work, and more compromise. This begins to affect how time and resources are used more widely, and over time, that impacts pupils.

If something underdelivers, the impact shows up in slower progress, missed opportunities, or support that doesn’t quite land as intended. Those effects don’t neatly reset after the 12-month contract ends.

That’s why decisions aren’t driven by the upfront cost alone, but by how confident schools feel in avoiding the cost of getting it wrong.

How schools actually judge value in practice

When you sit inside these conversations, you start to see the same patterns come up again and again.

Schools are weighing up a set of pressures that shape whether something feels like a sensible decision in context, and those pressures tend to show up in fairly consistent ways.

How clearly the case holds up when it’s discussed more widely

Decisions rarely sit with one person. They’re picked apart in leadership conversations, challenged from different angles, and compared against other priorities. If the reasoning feels loose or overly complex, it becomes harder to move forward with the purchase.

What difference it’s likely to make in practice

Whether that’s improved pupil outcomes, reduced workload, stronger results, or smoother operations, there needs to be a clear sense of what changes as a result of going ahead. Equally, there’s often an awareness of what happens if nothing changes - and whether that’s something the school is willing to accept.

What the product will actually require day to day

Schools look beyond the promise and into the reality of implementation. Time, training, ownership, and staff buy-in all come into play. Questions like “who’s going to run this?” or “where does this sit in an already stretched timetable?” are pivotal to whether something feels workable.

Whether it feels proven in a similar context

If a school can point to another setting where something is already working, it becomes much easier to stand behind. This is why peer recommendations and real-world examples carry so much weight in the early stages of decision-making.

How the spend holds up against competing priorities

Every decision sits alongside others that haven’t been made yet. Schools are constantly sense-checking whether this is the right place to allocate budget, given everything else that could be done with it.

Taken together, these factors shape how comfortable a school feels committing to a decision, and how easily that decision moves forward once it’s been raised.

Where suppliers get this wrong

Where this tends to fall down is in how value for money is presented in practice — particularly in how products are positioned, explained, and carried into those wider conversations.

Leading with price instead of justification

Discounts and lower pricing can help open a conversation, but they don’t do much to move it forward. Schools still need to explain why this is the right thing to spend money on, and price on its own doesn’t give them much to work with. If anything, it can raise more questions around what’s missing, how well it’ll work, and whether it’s going to hold up over time.

Assuming value is obvious

From a supplier perspective, the benefits can feel clear because you’re close to the product. But schools are looking at it alongside multiple other options, often in a limited amount of time. If the value isn’t immediately clear, it gets harder to justify, and easier to move on from. Clarity tends to win out over completeness in those situations.

Overloading with features instead of showing what actually changes

More detail doesn’t necessarily make a stronger case. Long lists of features, capabilities, or modules can make it harder to understand what the product actually does in practice. Schools are trying to work out what difference it’ll make to outcomes, workload, or operations. If that gets lost in the detail, the decision becomes harder to progress.

Ignoring how decisions get carried beyond the first conversation

What often gets missed is what happens after that initial conversation. If a teacher reads your email and then has to explain it off the top of their head to someone else, it becomes their explanation, not yours. If the value is hard to summarise or only really lands when it’s shown live, it’s much harder to keep the conversation going.

What this means for how you sell to schools

In a more selective, more scrutinised environment, small shifts in how you present your product can make a big difference.

Make the case easy to understand early

Schools shouldn’t have to work to figure out why something matters. The value should be clear within seconds, not minutes. If it takes too long to land, it becomes harder to carry into wider conversations and easier to deprioritise.

Reduce perceived risk wherever you can

Evidence, case studies, and testimonials from similar schools all make decisions feel safer and easier to support. The more familiar something feels, the less work it takes to stand behind it.

Focus on outcomes, not just capability

What matters is what changes as a result of using your product. Schools are trying to understand the tangible impact on outcomes, workload, or operations, not just what the product can do in theory.

Help schools make the internal case

Give them the language, the framing, and the proof they need to take that decision forward confidently. The easier it is to explain and defend, the more likely it is to progress.

Turn interest into decisions

School budgets are making spending harder, but it is still happening - just with more scrutiny, and a heightened need for confidence.

For suppliers, that puts more emphasis on being clear about impact, effort, and what a school can expect in practice.

We’re working through this with a number of organisations at the moment.

Book an education strategy call here to look at how your current approach lines up with how schools are weighing up spending this year.

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Education Marketing How to Sell to Schools Selling to Schools

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