Costa Rica is a terrific place but not known for its beer.
The primary brand seems to be Imperial, a not bad but not memorable beer.
That’s why I was delighted to happen upon The Volcano Brewing Company, which bills itself as the only craft beer brewer in the country. (They also run a very cool all-inclusive package for their hotel as well.)
There serve two beers: a brown ale and an IPA. And after three days of drinking Imperial, I can attest that Volcano Brewings beers tasted great.
You may not like beer, or maybe you drink beer but Coors light is as good as a Bud light as long as it is served cold.
I enjoy beer. I study beer. I sample beer everywhere I go. My brother owns a brewpub. So I can speak with some authority when I say that Volcano Brewing’s great beer isn’t that great.
Stacked up against truly rest beer, their beer just wouldn’t do that well. But compared to the familiar brands like Imperial, it tastes terrific. I’m not criticizing their beer (I enjoy the beer and the experience) but making a point about branding and marketing.
You don’t have to necessarily be “the best” to do well.
Here’s the phrase to contemplate:
Better by comparison.
Quality is almost always a matter of comparison. You don’t have to make the best beer in the world to be successful. You just have to make the best beer as compared to what’s available where you do business.
Are you trying too hard to be too good? To be too much better?
If you can be twice as good as your competition and still be profitable, then go for it. But you probably don’t have to be twice as good to be successful.
You’ve just got to be better by comparison.
World class is an admirable goal, but for many businesses, better by comparison is much more realistic and quite profitable.
(And if you ever get to Costa Rica, drive up to the Arenal area and say hello to the good folks at Volcano Brewing Company.)
Thanks for this post Mark.
A couple takeaways I got were that I have a tendency to think a little too big sometimes and your insight helped me recognize the importance of focus, taking one step at a time.
Striving to become a world class company is an admirable goal. Although most companies might not achieve this level of success, constantly striving to become better and better each day in hopes of becoming “world class” is a critical component to a company’s growth (in my opinion).
What I liked most about this post was your position on being better by comparison.
As I am building my first startup at 25, I used to have a focus on our website being everything and anything to all people. For all I knew, I thought we could solve world hunger with what we are doing. Not only did this affect the future vision of the company but it was not realistic to be thinking this way. Your post was a perfect example of this.
This is very interesting, the concept of not having to be the best. For many, Starbucks is considered the best, but a local neighborhood coffee shop can be good, but not the best. I suppose this can be extrapolated to other concepts such as athletes who excel, but just not like the gold medal winner. Suzanne