The myth that lowest price always wins still shows up in boardrooms and evaluation rooms. It sounds disciplined. In real competitions it often buys you the wrong outcome.
Price matters. It is rarely the whole story. A bid that undercuts everyone on day one can load risk into delivery, cut quality where you cannot see it, or force change notices that erase the “saving” by month six.
Why the myth fails
Lowest price wins when the requirement is truly commoditised, the specification is tight, and switching cost is low. Most public and international procurements are not that simple. Whole-life cost, delivery risk, capacity, and past performance change what “cheap” means. If your scoring only rewards the bottom number, suppliers will race there and leave the hard problems for later.
What to do instead
Write the commercial problem first. Then decide what must be pass/fail, what can be scored on quality or risk, and how price enters without drowning the rest. Use whole-life or total cost of ownership where it fits. Make the evaluation trail show why the award is defensible, not only why it was cheapest.
A practical next step
If your last few awards were driven by price alone and the aftercare has been noisy, review one recent file: would a modest quality or risk weight have changed the shortlist? A thirty-minute call is often enough to reshape the next competition before you issue it.