At first glance, iconic businesses look irrational. A pastrami sandwich at Katz’s Delicatessen in New York City’s Lower East Side, a Jewish deli founded in 1888, priced close to $30. A seat at Sukiyabashi Jiro in the Ginza district of Tokyo, where a short sushi meal can cost tens of thousands of yen. A crab omelette at Jay Fai in Bangkok’s Old Town, cooked over street-side flames and priced higher than many fine-dining menus. An all-you-can-eat ritual at The Carnivore Restaur

This toolkit builds directly on the earlier Stories of Business piece, When Food Becomes Surplus: The Business Decisions That Decide Its Fate , which explored how waste is rarely accidental and usually the result of upstream choices. What follows is the practical layer: how eateries can act once surplus exists, without creating new risks, costs, or unintended consequences. 1. Identify the Type of Surplus Before Acting Not all surplus is the same. – Predictable surplus comes f

In modern economies, consumers rely on signals. Stars. Scores. Badges. Rankings.Shortcuts that help people make decisions in complex markets where expertise, time, and information are unevenly distributed. But not all signals measure the same thing — and when they collide, trust becomes fragile. A recent case involving a Michelin-starred restaurant receiving a low food hygiene rating highlighted this tension sharply. The establishment retained global culinary prestige while f