Three Gates

Dear friend,

The riddle first, as the tradition demands. Back in the old town, in the yard behind the smithy, where a farmer has come about a gate and been given one price and no choices.

Two smiths are asked about a gate,
Both quote a figure, both quote straight.
One names one price and waits, and waits,
One names a third, a half, a whole.
Same iron, same hands, same afternoon.
Why did one farmer go away?

Hold your answer. Story time.

The Story

Two blacksmiths in the town I've never named, and their ironwork, in the old chorus, was equally strong. Each was asked in the same week about a field gate, and each knew exactly what was wanted and what it would cost.

The first said three pounds ten, which was right, and then stood there.

And the farmer, being handed a single figure, had only one question available to him, which was whether to pay it or not. That is a poor sort of question. It has a yes in it and a no, and the no is free and requires nothing of him, and a man standing in a yard being asked yes or no by somebody who wants his money will nearly always say he will think it over.

He did think it over, and he thought about the three pounds ten, since that was the only thing he had been given to think about. By the evening it had grown, as a lone figure does when a man turns it about in the dark, and he mended the old gate with a length of wire instead.

The second smith was asked the same question and answered it three ways, in about twenty seconds.

A repair to the old one with two new hinges and a strap, which would see out five or six winters, at one pound. The same gate as his neighbour's, made new, at three pounds ten. Or the heavy pattern with the galvanised fittings that his own father had hung on the top field, which would outlast the farmer, at six pounds.

And then he stopped talking, exactly as the demonstrator would have.

Watch what happened in the farmer's head. He was no longer deciding whether to spend money; he was deciding which gate he wanted, which is an entirely different afternoon's work. The one pound repair told him what cheap looked like and he did not want it, because a man shown the bottom rarely chooses it. The six pound gate told him what the top looked like and made three pounds ten feel like the sensible middle, which it was.

He took the three pounds ten, which is exactly what the first smith had offered him and he had refused.

Same gate, same price, same farmer, same week. One smith asked a yes-or-no question and got a no. The other asked a which-one question and got a gate.

The Lesson, Since You've Earned It

A single price invites a yes or a no, and the no costs the customer nothing. Three prices invite a choice, and every choice is a purchase. That is the whole of it. The question you ask decides the answers available, and most trades ask the hardest question in commerce without noticing, which is: will you give me money, yes or no.

Three options change the subject. The customer stops weighing you against nothing and starts weighing your work against your other work, which is ground you own entirely. And it takes the awkwardness out of the exchange, since a man choosing between three gates is engaged in a pleasant task, while a man being asked to approve one figure is being pressed, however gently.

Build the three honestly and they will nearly always take this shape. A small one that is genuinely useful and genuinely limited, which shows the customer what economy costs him. A middle one that is what most people should have, and which you expect most people to take. And a top one that is real, deliverable and better, which you would be glad to make tomorrow, since the cabinet-maker's warning about decoys holds here exactly: a top option nobody is meant to buy is a lie told with iron.

And name them, so the customer can hold them apart in his head and repeat them to his wife, as the miller named his flours. The repair, the standard gate, the heavy pattern. Three unnamed prices are a muddle; three named things are a menu.

Two cautions. Do not offer five, since a man given five options will postpone rather than choose, and the postponement looks exactly like the no you were avoiding. And say which one you would take, plainly, when asked, because a customer who cannot get a recommendation out of you will suspect the whole arrangement was built to confuse him.

Three questions, and use your last quote that came to nothing:

1. How many prices did you give? If the answer is one, you asked for a yes or a no, and you received the answer that costs nothing to give.
2. What is your honest small option? The repair, the partial job, the thing that genuinely helps and genuinely runs out. If you have not got one, your cheapest customers have nowhere to go but away.
3. What is your heavy pattern? The version you would be proud to make and rarely get asked for. Put it on the list, mean it, and watch what it does to the middle.

The Answer to the Riddle

Why did one farmer go away?

Because he had been given a number and nothing to set it against, so the only work left for him was to decide whether three pounds ten was too much, and a man alone with that question in the evening will generally decide that it is. His neighbour was given three gates and spent the same evening deciding which one he wanted. Both men were quoted three pounds ten by an honest smith. Only one of them was asked a question he could enjoy answering.

The verse:

One price is asked with yes or no,
And no is easy, cheap, and slow.
Name three, and let him weigh the three,
And he'll not weigh whether, but which.

Until next time. Go and take the thing you quote most often, build an honest small, middle and heavy version of it, and give all three to the next person who asks.

P.S. Watch what the three do to your own nerve as well. A man with one price must defend it, and defending is a poor position from which to be liked. A man with three has nothing to defend, since whatever the customer objects to, the answer is simply that there is another gate, and the conversation continues instead of ending.

Also in the archive: Three Tables, The Fourteen-Page Proposal and The Fourth Lever.