For those of you who often drink milk and cola, I wonder if you have ever thought about this question:

Why are milk boxes square, but Coke cans are cylindrical? ?

Some people may say that this is because--

People often hold Coke and drink it directly, while milk is often poured down to drink.

The square shape is not suitable for holding, so Coke is always cylindrical.

But in fact, the reason is much more than that.

The packaging method of cola and milk is not a whim decision made by the designer, but the result of careful economic calculation.

We all know---

Milk needs to be refrigerated.

This kind of logistics and storage method determines that the milk carton is square because: the refrigerator space is limited. If it is made into a Coke-type cylinder, when stacked together, there will be many gaps between each can of milk, which wastes valuable space.

The square boxes can be stacked tightly together without any waste of space.

So, the milk carton needs to be made square.

Soda pop cans and the like are kept at room temperature on the cheap metal shelving found elsewhere in the store (or arrayed into huge pyramids at the end of aisles). Soda pop cans and the like are generally Just need to keep it at room temperature. Most people see canned drinks stacked in a pyramid shape.

In life, we often take some things for granted without delving into the reasons behind why we do them.

We see various product designs and various placement methods in stores, but we have never thought about why it is like this and not other ways.

We often feel that product design is just the designer’s personal decision.

But in fact, there is an important theory in economics, that is:

The design has already been preordainedby market (or other) constraints. The limiting factors are determined.

The book we are going to talk about today is specifically about this:

The Economic Naturalist

Milk and Coke Economics

In fact, this The literal translation of the English name is "natural economist".

The original English version looks like this:

Its author is Robert Frank, the originator of "naturalist economics". He likes to use a large number of common examples in his books to Explain the knowledge of economics in simple and easy-to-understand terms.

If you are also interested in these hidden economic secrets in life, then Yingda strongly recommends that you get this book.

OK, let’s talk about today’s word preordain

It is the prefix pre- plus ordain. ordain means "destined", "command".

So preordain means "predetermined".

So, let's make a sentence~

You might think the company's success was preordained. But it's not.

You might think the company's success was preordained. Success is a given, but it’s not.