Ray Kroc

Here's how he saw it.

The company had the warehouses full of cups made at the old cost.

Selling them this week or next week made almost no difference to Lily.

But to the customer, it made all the difference.

It told them, I'm on your side.

It told them, you can trust me.

Now, invert it.

What if Ray had said nothing?

The price goes up.

The customer places their usual order.

All of a sudden, the invoice arrives at higher prices than expected.

Some customers shrug away and pay, but most feel a small sting of betrayal.

Prices went up and nobody told me.

What else aren't they telling me?

Maybe I should get quotes from other suppliers.

Ray's sales that month would look fine, but he'd have poisoned the next month and the month after that.

He'd have lost the assumption of trust that makes all of these relationships work.

His bosses saw just transactions, but Ray was really interested in the relationship.

And relationships are built in the small moments where you could be selfish and choose not to.

In the mid-1930s, Kroc was selling paper cups to a man named Earl Prince, who ran a chain of ice cream parlors called Prince Castle.