Rule of 2: The Unattainable Triangle
Debunking the Golden Rule for the modern day business
The Rule of 2, commonly applied to industries such as fine dining or construction, states that businesses must choose 2 of the following attributes: Quality, speed, price.
In other words:
-GOOD service CHEAP won’t be FAST.
-GOOD service FAST won’t be CHEAP.
-FAST service CHEAP won’t be GOOD.
In listening to an interview with Shake Shack founder Daniel Meyer, he suggested an interesting loophole in this rule.
He suggested that while the sum of the attributes must equal 2, that you do not have to completely sacrifice one of the key attributes (speed, quality, price).
A .7 for speed + .6 for quality + .7 for price= 2
As it relates to positioning, this gives businesses the leverage to address a more granular target market with a specific value proposition. With businesses becoming increasingly successful doing 1 thing very well for a specific group of people (i.e. Discord for Gamers) there is white space in many industries to customize your speed, quality and price formula to serve a specific customer better.
What is your magic formula for your your target market?