Variety of options slows down: Costs, overhead costs, margin

Legacy Burdens Instead of New Business When the Variety of Options Becomes a Trap

2026-06-10 From Andreas Renk, Digitalization Consultant | Translated by AI 5 min Reading Time

When flexibility paralyzes operations: Variety of options significantly increases overhead costs and reduces net margins because coordination, planning, and maintenance efforts rise disproportionately. Eight questions help with honest portfolio evaluation.

Too many different variants make handling confusing. A changed component does not only affect one bill of materials but also requires adjustments in inspection plans, documentation, parameterization, and spare parts logic.(Image: © Radoman Durkovic - stock.adobe.com) — Too many different variants make handling confusing. A changed component does not only affect one bill of materials but also requires adjustments in inspection plans, documentation, parameterization, and spare parts logic.
(Image: © Radoman Durkovic - stock.adobe.com)

It starts innocently: A customer needs a special version. Sales says yes, engineering handles it. Once. Then again. Then it becomes standard practice. At some point, there are 300 active variants in the system, and the best people in design are maintaining legacy issues instead of driving new business forward. The answer to the question of how it got to this point is almost always the same: Every single decision was understandable. But no one evaluated them as a whole.

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