# A Book That Made Me Rethink What We Should Stop Doing

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/yesterday-i-went-to-mars-7106663/a-book-that-made-me-rethink-what-we-should-stop-doing
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/yesterday-i-went-to-mars-7106663/a-book-that-made-me-rethink-what-we-should-stop-doing.md
Podcast: [*“Yesterday, I Went to Mars ♡”*](https://stenobird.com/podcast/yesterday-i-went-to-mars-7106663)
Published: 2026-07-11T12:27:35+00:00
Episode link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/makotowillolympusmons/episodes/A-Book-That-Made-Me-Rethink-What-We-Should-Stop-Doing-e3lun5k
Audio file: https://anchor.fm/s/fcce555c/podcast/play/122690164/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-6-11%2F829d695d-51be-eeee-f924-5c021da725c6.mp3
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JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/yesterday-i-went-to-mars-7106663/episodes/a-book-that-made-me-rethink-what-we-should-stop-doing
Duration seconds: 176

## Resource

This episode reflects on a book about small business strategy — and what it means to deliberately subtract, not just add. The book in question was found through a newsletter review, written by the founder of a uniform company who grew revenue two hundredfold by deciding exactly what his company would refuse to sell: commodity products, things priced too low to defend, anything easily purchased through Amazon. It touches on a resource allocation principle from the book — 53% of attention toward understanding customers, 27% toward products, just 13% toward competitors — and what that kind of deliberate redirection looks like in practice for a small eyewear shop. There's also a quiet moment around a line from the book: "We just do that obvious thing, completely and without exception." The observation that large companies tend to abandon precisely this kind of unglamorous, detailed care — and that the gap they leave is exactly where a small business can live. A small reflection on seventeen years in, and the question that feels increasingly important: not what to add, but what to stop doing.

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## Transcript

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