MAP Policy Documents: What Belongs in One

Enforcement arguments come down to definitions. Whether a stacked coupon counts, whether the cart price is an advertised price, whether a bundle discount lands on your part. If the document does not answer those questions, every notice you send opens a negotiation.

So the useful way to read a MAP policy is as a list of definitions with consequences attached. Here is what has to be in it.

What the policy governs

Name the parts it covers, by part number, with a dated figure for each. Name the channels: your dealers’ own sites, the marketplaces, print, paid search copy, email. Give the document a version and a date, because you will change the figures and a seller will eventually price off an old copy.

Then define the advertised price itself. At minimum the document should say where each of these stands.

• coupon codes, both seller-issued and platform-issued
• a strikethrough or compare-at price displayed next to yours
• bundles and multi-buys where the discount can be attributed to your part
• free shipping, gift cards and store credit offered with the part
• the price shown in the cart before checkout, and whether a cart-only price satisfies the policy

That last item is where a policy can stay deliberately silent, and silence there is a choice to make on purpose.

The legal posture, in plain terms

We are not lawyers and none of this is legal advice. Two points shape how these documents get drafted, and both belong in the first conversation with counsel.

A MAP policy governs the advertised price. The price a reseller may actually sell at is a different subject, which is what keeps MAP distinct from resale price maintenance. In the US, a manufacturer’s unilateral decision about whom it keeps supplying has been treated differently from an agreement on price. That treatment dates from United States v. Colgate and Co., 250 U.S. 300 (1919). Resale price maintenance is judged under the rule of reason following Leegin Creative Leather Products v. PSKS, 551 U.S. 877 (2007). Several states are stricter than federal law.

Is your policy an announced unilateral policy, or a signed agreement? That is a question for counsel, and not for marketing. Ask it before you send anyone a signature request.

Consequences you are prepared to apply

Write down the sequence: notice, repeat contact, and the point at which supply stops. Then check every line against a simple test. Would you do this to your largest account? A consequence you will not apply to the dealer who matters most is one your dealers will learn to read as optional.

Keep the tiers few and concrete. Withdrawal of co-op advertising funds, removal from the authorised list you publish, a Do Not Sell instruction to your distributors. Leave out anything that depends on a platform treating a pricing violation as an infringement claim, because it is not one.

The part that buys compliance

Compliance costs a dealer margin today for a benefit that arrives later, so the document should say what sits on the other side. Co-op advertising funds conditioned on compliance, early access to stock, inclusion on the dealer list your customers see.

A policy that contains only penalties gets treated as a cost of doing business with you. One that ties money to compliance gets read by the person who controls the pricing.

Distribution is part of the document

A policy nobody received is the weakest thing you can bring to an argument. Send it to every authorised seller, record who received it and when, and send it again when the figures change. New sellers appear against your catalogue continuously, so the sending has to be a standing process, not a launch event.

Internally, the people who need it are the ones under sales pressure. A regional manager clearing old stock at quarter end will find the policy inconvenient, which is exactly when it gets tested.

Once the document is right, the work moves to finding violations and running the sequence, and to the order a programme is rolled out in.