The scene
I was in New York for a conference in October, with a few open hours between sessions. I did what I tell Thrive Vibes members to do on any trip: I picked places that have nothing to do with my industry and went in with one question. Mine was simple. What are people really paying for here?
Three answers came back, and none of them was the thing on the sign.
A cat cafe on the Lower East Side
Meow Parlour opened in December 2014 as the city’s first permanent cat cafe. The pastry comes from a separate shop around the corner, because the health code keeps food prep and cats apart. You book a time slot online, you take off your shoes at the door, and every cat in the room is adoptable through a local rescue, KittyKind. At opening, thirty minutes cost $4 and the slots were booked out for weeks (DNAinfo, 2014).
What they sell is a calm half hour with an animal, in a city where most apartments do not allow one, and they attach that half hour to a rescue’s adoption pipeline. The pastry shop was the first business; the cafe grew out of it.
A color factory in SoHo
Color Factory began in 2017 as a nine-month pop-up in San Francisco, built by a group of artists and creatives. The New York location opened in August 2018 with sixteen installations across 20,000 square feet. Tickets include treats from local partners, photo booths with real cameras sit throughout the space, and the exhibits change two or three times a year. The chief executive describes the mission as inspiring joy and human connection through color and art, and says the company wants people to put their phones down (blooloop).
What they sell is a feeling with a photo attached, on a timer, with a reason to come back when the rooms change.
Two Uber drivers
What they sell, officially, is a ride. What I heard about was everything else: the second business, the way they read a passenger in the first minute, the thing they do that the app never asked for.
The method
Here is what I did at each stop, and it takes less than ten minutes.
- Name the real purchase. Finish the sentence “People are paying for...” without using the word on the sign. If you cannot, watch three customers and try again.
- Find the partner. Each of these businesses leaned on someone else: a rescue, local food makers, a platform that brings the customer to the curb. Who carries part of the load, and what do they get back?
- Find the clock. A thirty-minute slot. A ticket window. A ride from here to there. Time was built into every one of these, and it shaped how the place felt.
- Write one line in your notes before you leave. I noticed. It made me wonder. I could test.
Two business writers gave this a name. Pine and Gilmore called it the experience economy: people pay for the time and the feeling, and the pastry or the ride comes along with it.
Apply it
Your three-business Saturday
You do not need New York for this. Pick three businesses within thirty minutes of home that sell something different from what is on the sign.
- A place that sells time.
- A place that sells a feeling.
- A service where the person doing the work is the product.
- Go on a Saturday morning. Ask the question, find the partner, find the clock, and write your three lines.
- Bring one idea back and test it in the next 30 days.
If you want a question to carry, use mine: what are people really paying for here?
A note on manners, since these are working businesses. Buy something. Ask before you photograph a person. If someone is busy, say thank you and move on. These businesses are independent examples I visited as a customer, not partners.
Ready to practice it? Know Your Customer, the NextReady Studio workshop, runs Wednesday, November 18, 7:00 to 8:30 a.m. Arizona time, live on Zoom. Save a seat.
Plan your own outing around this question.
Join Thrive Vibes and the free DIY planner is yours right away. I reply by name when you share what you tried. New here? Start with what an entrepreneurial experience is.
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Common questions
What can small businesses learn from New York?
Look past the product on the sign. A cat cafe sells a calm half hour, a color museum sells a feeling with a photo, and a driver sells more than the ride. Name what people are really paying for, find the partner, and find the clock.
What is the experience economy?
It is the idea, from Pine and Gilmore in Harvard Business Review (1998), that people pay for time and memorable experiences, not only goods and services.