The Goldilocks Choice

A famous rock star, through a haze of cigarette smoke and a table covered with empty bottles, once claimed that a 32-track audio recording was ridiculous.

Why? Because, he said, while a producer might love the power of orchestrating so many inputs and manipulating the wide spectrum of sound, the average person can’t distinguish more than eight tracks.

His casual observation holds a simpler truth: We think we want a lot of choices in our life, but deep down that’s bull. It only creates noise and anxiety.

Crayons

It starts early in life, too. We plead for the 64-count box of crayons, certain we need all of them, but then wind up using our favorite six. Desert Sand and Magic Mint come out maybe once or twice, certainly never enough to require the built-in sharpener in the back.

It accelerates from there, until one day you’re standing in the cereal aisle, dumbfounded, trying to differentiate between a dozen distinct varieties of Special K. Can they all be Special?

Ever been in the mood for a movie on the couch and then fallen into a scrolling coma, unable to decide from the billions rolling past your eyes?

Choice in reasonable doses is good, and I doubt anyone would voluntarily ask for fewer options. We’re brainwashed to believe that the pallet with hundreds of choices is a gift from the gods, like they’re doing us a big favor.

But we all know more is rarely better. Fifty shades of crap is still crap, no matter how they alter the packaging.

Business owners have bought into a misguided belief that a dazzling display of options makes them look like they care about us. That’s backwards; you’re making us work too hard.

It’s easy to choose between two or three things and feel confident in your selection. But when there are twenty, you’ll never believe your choice is based on anything logical or concrete; it simply becomes a random selection so you can just be done with it.

Paralyzing

There’s also the classic issue of analysis paralysis. The process of choosing becomes so overwhelming that you make no decision at all. I mean, have you seen the menu at The Cheesecake Factory?

It actually goes against our brain’s natural capacity for problem solving. A restaurant consultant once wrote that seven items per category was the maximum for ordering efficiency. Any more than that and the customer merely freaks out and orders the same thing she always does.

A popular dive bar in Sedalia, Colorado, understands this. Their menu has a total of four items: Hamburger, Double-Meat Hamburger, Cheeseburger, Double-Meat Cheeseburger.

That’s all you get. Pick one and sit down.

And the place is always packed.

I’m not saying its popularity is entirely based on the stress-free menu, but it probably doesn’t hurt.

Goldilocks

What we secretly long for, I think, is the Goldilocks solution: Please let us choose between only three. We can easily handle three.

In fact, here’s a little trick a few companies have learned: Give the consumer three size options and that consumer will pick medium. Almost every flippin’ time. They eliminate any possibility of you ordering a small by offering a medium and a large, thereby increasing their profits.

The medium is the Goldilocks, and it makes most of us really, really happy.

So, no, 32 tracks aren’t necessary to make good music. Many of the all-time classics were recorded with two or four tracks, total.

We don’t need, nor really want, 25 different kinds of Oreos, and three soup choices on the menu are plenty. Honestly, we’d probably be satisfied with two, as long as one of them is minestrone or tomato bisque.

And, ultimately, with almost any decision we’re happier to just flip a coin. Nobody was ever paralyzed having to choose between heads and tails.

We call it, we watch the result, and we get on with our life.

Dom Testa is a broadcaster and author.

His series of spy thrillers, the Eric Swan series , is available in print, ebook, and audiobook at your favorite retailer.

Recording studio photo courtesy of Jiroe on Unsplash
Perplexed pic courtesy of Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash
Three image courtesy of Tony Hand on Unsplash