Festival offer discount depth vs contribution worksheet

Festival discounts without contribution math destroy January. This sheet is a labelled synthetic teaching set: inputs are illustrative, not industry averages. Google documents how Play promotions and offer codes work for one-time products (Play Console promotions help; Play Billing one-time promotions). Those pages define how a promotion can be configured; they do not tell you which discount depth recovers paid UA.

Define the calculation

Enter list price, festival discount percent, expected incremental paying users from the festival flight, and contribution margin per paying user after store fee and tax assumptions you supply. Contribution from the discounted offer is compared with the UA spend you assign to the festival cohort.

Synthetic example

List price 9.99 currency units, discount 40%, net offer price 5.994. Assume 1,200 incremental payers and contribution 2.50 per payer after your fee/tax line. Contribution = 3,000. If festival UA spend assigned to the cohort is 4,500, surplus is −1,500 — the discount depth does not recover the flight on these inputs.

Evidence and limits

Play’s promotion machinery is the definitional source for store-side discounts. Contribution, fee rate, VAT and incremental payer counts are studio assumptions. No CPI, ROAS or “festival always pays back” claim is included. Replace every synthetic input with your finance-approved figures before a live decision.

Download the evidence table.

Research checked 20 September 2026. Local draft; human editorial review pending. No CMS write performed.