How 3 Companies Earn More by Catering to Lazy

People are lazier than you think, so leverage human nature to work in your company's favor.

EXPERT OPINION BY ENTREPRENEURS’ ORGANIZATION  @ENTREPRENEURORG
AUG 24, 2023

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Barry Raber, an Entrepreneurs' Organization (EO) member in Portland, Oregon, is president and CEO of Business Property Trust, a Portland-based real estate investment firm that owns and manages covered RV and self-storage in Arizona and Texas. As a thought leader who shares experiences for businesses at Real Simple Business, we asked Barry about enhancing customer experience by catering to the human tendency toward laziness.

People are lazier than you think. This was an aha moment I had while remodeling older self-storage properties for my last company, Bargain Storage. This aha came when we bought a property with second-floor storage units only accessible by stairs.

The second-floor storage was only a quarter occupied. We figured we would just lower the price a little, clean it up, and it would fill. It didn't. I reasoned that many renters had to bring their things downstairs to move out of their house or apartment, so they shouldn't have an issue climbing them to a storage unit for the right price. But they didn't rent at any price.

We decided to bite the bullet and install an elevator. And they filled up!

While this is the most obvious example, there are many others where, when we bit the bullet and catered to the lazy, it worked, and we made more money because of it -- enough to pay for the upgrade and then some. In our current company, Carefree RV Storage, propane is a good example: Customers asked for it to be onsite rather than at a gas station a few miles away. It was costly to build, required special training, and we had to fill tanks daily. But, we get 5-star reviews mentioning the convenience of it, which propels more sales and allows us to charge a little more for our space.

Now, when faced with a feature request or design question, I always opt to cater to laziness and admit the customer is right. After all, what we want to do isn't the point of being in business.

I asked a few members of EO Portland if they catered to laziness in their businesses. My inbox filled up with examples and anecdotes. Here are three more ways companies achieved this:

1. Craft a Real-Time Pricing Solution

Justin Riordan, the founder of home-staging company Spade and Archer, shared his aha moment: He needed to buy some razor blades, but instead of driving a few blocks to buy them at Walgreens, he took out his phone and ordered them from Amazon, which took two minutes instead of 30 minutes. "I realized at that moment that it was too hard to work with my company," he said.

As a result, Spade and Archer dismantled their entire sales process, built an instant-pricing machine, and made it so that clients could get a set price in under five minutes -- instead of two weeks. Their sales process used to involve two or three phone calls, in-person meetings and took a total of two weeks. Their former sales rate was around 33 percent after a site visit; it is now 98 percent after a site visit.

2. Unleash Efficiency with Subscription Models

Augusto Carneiro, founder of Nossa Familia Coffee, shared a great example of catering to the lazy: Online coffee subscriptions!

Customers choose their favorite coffee, the quantity they want, and the frequency of shipments. They enter payment info once, and voilà: They get a guaranteed supply of freshly roasted coffee on hand at all times!

"We recommend people start with a two-pound bag monthly for optimal shipping and maximum savings," Augusto explained. From there, skipping a shipment or speeding it up is super easy. Also, there's no such thing as having too much on hand. Coffee makes a great gift -- it's like having a bottle of wine handy for that dinner party!

Nossa Familia offers additional benefits, such as early access and discounts, but the "set it and forget it" convenience is the number one benefit of being a coffee subscriber. It's a win-win because, from a business perspective, it is tremendously helpful to spread out shipments throughout the month and provide predictability for their roasting and production team.

3. Expand Customer Communication Options

Five Star Guitars co-founder Geoff Metts shared some of the company's recent attempts to increase convenience for customers by expanding interactions beyond store hours:

A live chat system on the website, linked to Facebook, allows web customers to ask questions in real time without coming in or even picking up the phone.
A dedicated text line empowers customers to communicate with the store via text message for all manner of reasons, including work order updates, stocking inquiries, or placing special orders.
Online scheduling software enables students to purchase, schedule, and reschedule lessons at their convenience. The system fosters smoother communication between students and teachers while automating standard communication between students and the store (such as scheduling reminders, etc.). As a bonus, it enables the store to offer auto-pay for recurring students.

"We have received genuinely positive feedback from customers since making these changes," Geoff said. "We endeavor to make every decision based on whether it makes Five Star Guitars a better place to work or shop. While the live chat and text line have definitely made things more convenient for customers, the online scheduling has helped everyone involved through automation."

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Barry Raber, is an Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) Member, CEO of Business Property Trust, a Portland, Oregon, company that owns and manages RV storage through Carefree Covered RV Storage and self-storage through Bargain Storage. He is also a thought leader who shares experiences for businesses at Real Simple Business.

FAQ: How to Earn More by Catering to Lazy Customers

What does "cater to lazy" mean in a business context?

Catering to lazy means designing your products, services, and customer experience around the reality that people will consistently choose the path of least resistance — and that when you make it easier to buy from you, more people do. It's not a criticism of your customers; it's an honest acknowledgment of human nature. Barry Raber calls it putting on your "lazy glasses" — viewing every aspect of your business through the lens of what a customer would avoid doing if they had a choice. Every time he's applied that lens, the result has been more customers.

Why should businesses cater to customer laziness?

Because friction kills sales. If your business requires customers to jump through hoops — multiple phone calls, long wait times, inconvenient locations, confusing processes — a meaningful portion of them will simply choose a competitor or go without. Catering to convenience isn't about lowering standards; it's about removing unnecessary barriers between your customer and a yes. Raber's experience across multiple businesses shows a consistent pattern: when you invest in eliminating inconvenience, customers reward you with more business, better reviews, and a willingness to pay a premium.

What is the "lazy glasses" approach to business?

The "lazy glasses" approach means deliberately stepping back and asking: where is my customer being asked to do something they'd rather not do? It's a mental framework for auditing your customer experience through the eyes of someone who will take the easiest option available to them. When you find those friction points — a price that takes two weeks to get, a product that requires an extra trip, a communication channel that isn't convenient — you've found your next opportunity to grow revenue.

What was Barry Raber's original "cater to lazy" aha moment?

Raber discovered the principle while remodeling self-storage properties for Bargain Storage. One property had second-floor units accessible only by stairs. The units sat at 25% occupancy. Raber assumed lowering the price would solve it — people had to bring their belongings downstairs to move anyway, so stairs shouldn't be a deterrent. But the units didn't fill at any price. After installing an elevator, they filled completely. The lesson: convenience isn't just a preference for customers — for some friction points, it's a hard requirement that no amount of discounting can overcome.

Can catering to convenience actually justify higher prices?

Yes — and Raber's own businesses demonstrate it. At Carefree RV Storage, customers asked for onsite propane rather than driving to a gas station miles away. Installing it was costly, required special staff training, and meant daily tank refills. But the result was consistent 5-star reviews specifically mentioning the convenience, which drove more bookings and allowed the company to charge a slight premium for the overall experience. The investment paid for itself and then some. Convenience is a genuine differentiator that customers will pay for when it solves a real friction point.

How did one company boost its sales conversion rate from 33% to 98%?

Justin Riordan, founder of home-staging company Spade and Archer, had his own lazy-glasses moment when he realized it was faster to order razor blades from Amazon in two minutes than to drive three blocks to a drugstore. He turned that insight on his own business and realized his sales process — two or three phone calls, in-person meetings, and a two-week timeline to get a price — was asking too much of potential clients. He dismantled the entire process and built an instant-pricing tool that delivers a firm quote in under five minutes. The result: conversion after a site visit jumped from 33% to 98%.

What are the best examples of catering to lazy customers?

Three standout examples from the article illustrate the principle across very different industries:

Instant pricing (Spade and Archer)
Replacing a two-week, multi-call sales process with an online pricing tool that delivers a quote in under five minutes. Conversion soared from 33% to 98%.
Coffee subscriptions (Nossa Familia Coffee)
Letting customers choose their coffee, quantity, and delivery frequency once, then receiving automatic shipments on their schedule. The "set it and forget it" model removes the friction of remembering to reorder and creates predictable recurring revenue for the business.
Expanded communication options (Five Star Guitars)
Adding a website live chat linked to Facebook, a dedicated text line for order updates and inquiries, and online scheduling software for music lessons. Customers can interact on their terms, on their preferred channel, without having to call or come in.

How do subscription models cater to customer laziness?

Subscriptions remove the single biggest friction point in repeat purchasing: remembering to buy again. Once a customer sets up a subscription, they never have to think about it — the product arrives automatically, at the right frequency, charged to a payment method they entered once. Augusto Carneiro of Nossa Familia Coffee describes it as "set it and forget it." For the customer, it means never running out of something they use regularly. For the business, it creates predictable recurring revenue, smoother production planning, and a deeply loyal customer base. Both sides win — which is exactly what a well-designed convenience feature should deliver.

How can expanding communication channels reduce customer friction?

Every customer has a preferred way to interact with a business — some want to call, some want to text, some want live chat, and some want to handle everything online at midnight without talking to anyone. When you only offer one or two channels, you're asking everyone who prefers the others to adapt to you. Five Star Guitars addressed this by adding a live chat system, a dedicated text line, and online scheduling. The result is that customers can get answers, place orders, and book appointments on their own terms — which removes the barrier that was silently costing the business sales it never knew it was losing.

What friction points should I look for in my own business?

Start by mapping every step a customer takes from first awareness to completed purchase — and then ask honestly: where would a lazy person give up? Common friction points include pricing that requires a conversation or a wait, products or services with inconvenient access (location, hours, format), communication that requires a customer to initiate multiple contacts, checkout or onboarding processes with too many steps, and any feature your customers have explicitly asked for that you haven't yet provided. That last one is especially valuable — a customer who asks for something is telling you exactly where friction exists.

Does catering to lazy customers mean lowering your standards?

No — it means raising your standards for the customer experience. The businesses in this article that catered to laziness didn't cut corners on quality; they invested more: in elevators, in propane infrastructure, in new software, in rebuilt sales processes. The commitment to convenience is a high standard, not a low one. What you're eliminating is unnecessary effort on the customer's part, not quality in your product or service.

Is catering to convenience a good strategy for any type of business?

Yes. The specific tactics will vary by industry, but the underlying principle — that customers choose the path of least resistance and reward businesses that make it easier — applies universally. Service businesses can streamline quoting and scheduling. Product businesses can offer subscriptions and faster purchasing. Brick-and-mortar businesses can expand hours, add online options, and improve physical accessibility. The lazy-glasses audit works in any context because human nature is consistent: given two options of equal quality, people will choose the easier one every time.