By causing the customer to pay attention to something surprising, a business makes it more important in their eyes; small 'irritation-as-innovation' details can completely re-weight the consumer's utility function.
Sutherland argues that when you cause a customer to notice an unexpected, well-handled detail, it becomes disproportionately important. Car rental is his example: a $600 rental starts by making you queue and hunt for the car in 110° heat, while a $100 taxi meets you at arrivals and pushes your luggage — the unmeasured first 20 minutes is the terrible, neglected part. ✦ AI generated
Rory Sutherland · My First Million · 2026-07-27 · original ↗
starts at this moment · 14:30
when you cause the cu- customer to pay attention to something, it consequently becomes more important. Because it's surprising and because it it's attention-grabbing, it therefore suddenly uh causes the consumer to completely re-weight their utility function... why is it that when I book a taxi for $100 to pick me up from the airport here in London, they meet me at arrivals and even push my trolley with luggage to the car park, yeah? But if I rent a car for $600, I've got to find and queue at the car rental desk... in some cases, I would literally happily pay 100 quid if the deal is, 'We meet you at arrivals, okay? We take the luggage to the car. We hand you the keys.'
verbatim transcript · starts at 14:30
14:19expensive hotel, a laundry experience that isn't a bit of a pain in the ass? You know, you've got to fill in a form, you've got to put it in the bag. By the way, if you get your laundry back, they never replace the bag the second day. So, if you want a second lot of laundry, you've got to ring up and ask for another bag and another form. Okay? Now,
14:37what would happen if a hotel If I stayed in a hotel, which was I'm not saying you could be totally [ __ ] okay, as a hotel, as long as you have a brilliant laundry service. You know, Apple is, you know, on a par technologically with other entities, but it's sensationally good at the emotional component. You know, Buc-ee's is what we But it's it's it's a thing apart. You know, U- Uber doesn't
14:59have cabs that smell of urine. I'm not suggesting you can neglect the other stuff. But I think what you can do is that when you cause the cu- customer to pay attention to something, it consequently becomes more important. Because it's surprising and because it it's attention-grabbing, it therefore suddenly uh causes the consumer to completely re-weight their utility function. Now, one of my examples would be car rental. I don't I
15:27don't know if you rent cars at airports, presumably occasionally. >> Hate doing it. Yeah. >> Yeah, exactly. Hate doing it. Now, once you've driven out of the car park, it's the same [ __ ] It doesn't really matter. Maybe you can make rental return a bit better, but let's not worry about that, okay? I just ask the question, why is it that when I book a taxi for $100 to pick me
15:47up from the airport here in London, they meet me at arrivals and even push my trolley with luggage to the car park, yeah? But if I rent a car for $600, I've got to find and queue at the car rental desk. Then I've got to go and find, often in like 110° heat, I've got to go and find the car, and then, by the way, there is
16:08there isn't even a laminated sheet of A4 paper in the car saying, "This is how you open the fuel filler cap. This is how you release the handbrake." You know, there's nothing, right? Once you're in the car, about 10-20 minutes in, you start to enjoy it. But that initial bit, which nobody seems to be measuring, is the bit that's terrible. Now, in some cases, I would literally happily pay 100
16:31quid if the deal is, "We meet you at arrivals, okay? We take the luggage to the car. We hand you the keys. We answer your questions about how the car works." If, by the way, they also turn the air Now, you could do this with electric cars. If they also turn the air conditioning on 10 minutes in advance, okay? Now you've done something which is Now, there's that thing What What's
16:52What's that funny thing? Turo, isn't there? I think. Which because it's humans might might be able to create something a bit like that. >> Yeah, they I I use Turo all the time. They have a thing where it will the the owner will drive to your home. >> And because of that, by the way, when I rent cars at large American airports, at Phoenix or somewhere like