I am fortunate to live in a country that is a representative democracy (or at least it’s supposed to be) with a capitalism market economy.

A few years ago, I explained about the United States system of government. One of the posts was on Civics 101, which discussed the fundamental structure of the U.S.’s representative democracy. I’m not going to rehash it entirely. But the gist is that the U.S. has 3 branches of government that are meant to be independent, separate branches, each tasked in the Constitution with their own separate powers. The concept of separation of powers was so that one branch could not take over the other two. Yet while the 3 branches are separate, they are also interdependent and provide checks and balances on each other.

Okay. If you’ve been following any of the U.S. political news lately, you get that this separation of powers is part of the crisis the U.S. government has right now. That one branch is really trying to impede upon and circumvent the other 2 branches.

But I digress. Because that’s not the thing I want to discuss right now.

One of the great freedoms that the U.S.’s representative democracy affords is the ability to express one’s opinions, even if those opinions differ from any person in a position of power. And by power, I mean any kind of power, whether political or economical. (That being said, there are some limitations freedom of speech. And I want to make clear that freedom to express one’s opinions does not mean freedom from consequences.)

Okay, so that leads me to the U.S. market economy—the wonderful world of capitalism.

Capitalism means that people, not the government, own most businesses. Those businesses decide what to sell and how much money to charge for products or services. Then the people decide what they want to buy. Whether to buy something is a decision that’s often based on the cost of the product or other quantifiable factors. But this decision can also be based on nonquantifiable factors.

This is a really simplified explanation of capitalism. But it gets the main point that it is individuals, whether the individual(s) (aka the business) selling or the individuals purchasing, who make the choices.

It’s all about choices.

What this all means, for the man babies in the room who don’t seem to grasp this concept, is that I don’t have to buy your goods. And since I live in a representative democracy, which also allows for freedom of speech, I can express my opinions about your goods and encourage my friends and family not to buy them either. Because guess what.

WE HAVE A CHOICE.

We vote not only for those who will represent us in our government, we also vote with our money. Every time I spend my money on a product, like a rather overpriced burnt coffee from a certain starry mermaid coffee chain, I am essentially saying that I like your product and I’d like for you to keep providing it. When I stop spending money on overpriced burnt coffee, I am essentially saying I no longer support your product.

Same as when I go to the polls in November to vote for my elected representative. If enough people stop buying the product or they choose to buy a competitor’s product, the business either has to make changes or close.

Barnes & Noble is a actually fantastic example of capitalism at work. (And I’m not just saying that because they sell books.)

B&N had incredible growth from the time it went public in 1993 to until around 2008 when it was at it’s peak with over 700 stores. But this was when Amazon became a serious threat.

Amazon adopted a price-loss strategy, where it was essentially losing money on books. But guess what, by that time, Amazon was becoming what we know it to be today—a super marketplace where a shopper can essentially buy anything. It wasn’t quite the expansive markeplace in 2008, but it was offering more than just books.

B&N tried to directly compete. It launched the Nook e-reader in 2009 to compete with Amazon’s Kindle, which came out in 2007. They redid their website to stoke online sales. They added toys, games, and other non-book related merchandise to stores.They even tried opening cafes in the stores.

And guess what, their strategy backfired. Fewer people chose to shop at B&N. As a result, in 2010, B&N started closing stores. Between 2013 and 2018, B&N went through 5 CEOs. In 2018, the company lost $18 million, had closed over 100 stores, and fired 1,800 full-time employees.

At this point, B&N might have gone the way of Borders—bankrupt and out of business. But B&N was saved when it was acquired in 2019 and the new owners named former Waterstones’ CEO James Daunt as CEO.

Daunt found that B&N stores were “crucifyingly boring.” (He wasn’t wrong.) So he set out to “create an environment that’s intellectually satisfying—and not in a snobbish way, but in the sense of feeding your mind.”

Even though all 600 stores had to close during the start of the covid pandemic, Daunt took that time to redesign the stores. And he started with asking the employees to scrutinize each book in their store and decide if it belonged there.

He decentralized book buying, empowered local store managers to craft their offering mix, encouraged managers to curate selections based on their interests, and focused on promoting what interested that particular store’s customers.

In other words, instead of the same B&N in every city, each one was slightly different. Each store was tailored to the neighbor/town. It focused on those nonquantifiable factors.

In 2021, sales exceeded pre-pandemic levels and continued to grow. B&N has since opened new stores, some of which occupy locations where Amazon’s brick-and-mortar bookstores failed.

There are several articles where you can read more about James Daunt and how he turned B&N around. But the point is that shoppers voted with their money.

Before Daunt, buyers went elsewhere, mostly because the prices were cheaper but also because, as Daunt found, the stores were boring carbon copies. But guess what, capitalism isn’t as simple as having the cheapest prices. Those nonquantifiable factors matter. When the B&N stores started tailoring each store to their community, people came back. B&N management empowered the people at the local level and it worked. Their communities responded.

Because it’s not always about who has the best product or cheapest product.

Honestly, I could fill multiple blog posts about companies who had superior products but their businesses failed for a variety of reasons. I could also fill an equal number of posts about businesses who succeed even if they didn’t have the cheapest or bestest product.

Here’s the thing.

More and more people in this internet/social media/20-second news cycle age are using their dollars to not just buy products but to support companies who are doing good things. Who have strong ethical and moral codes. Who support their employees with fair wages and reasonable schedules. Who care about the communities they are selling in. And these same people are encouraging their friends to support these businesses too.

Capitalism. It’s not about having the cheapest or bestest. It’s often about those extras nonquantifiables, like being a decent citizen and a good neighbor.

So if your stock starts tanking because people choose not to buy your product because you’re an amoral asshole who’s insults women and minorities and tries to blacklist those who disagree with you, then guess what. That’s the beauty of a free market economy. Life’s tough.

As for me, I’ll keep supporting business who have good products and are good world citizens.

To anyone who may be offended by this post, you certainly have the right to have a different opinion. And I welcome opposing thoughts and opinions. I actually like to hear how other’s think about issues because I often learn something. That being said, you do not have the right to bully, threaten, harass, or generally be a dick to me or anyone else who comments. Any comments that do any of those things will be deleted. (See what I mean? Consequences.) You are welcome to state your opinion but please do it in a respectful manner. Let’s have a civil conversation.