Profit in business comes from repeat customers, customers that

Host: The city night glowed with a strange kind of electric loneliness. Skyscrapers loomed over the narrow streets, their windows lit like stars, while a soft drizzle fell, making the neon lights blur into long, trembling reflections. A small diner sat at the corner—old, chrome, and stubbornly alive amid the digital world around it.

Inside, the smell of coffee and rain-soaked asphalt mingled in the air. The clock above the counter had stopped at 9:47 years ago, but no one cared.

Jack sat in the booth by the window, his grey eyes fixed on his laptop screen, the light from it catching the edge of his sharp cheekbones. His tie was loosened, his shirt sleeves rolled, and exhaustion clung to him like a second skin. Across from him, Jeeny stirred her cup of tea, her fingers delicate but steady, her gaze patient and knowing.

Outside, cars whispered by. Inside, time seemed to pause.

Jeeny: “You’ve been staring at those numbers for an hour. What are you looking for, Jack?”

Jack: “A way to make this quarter look less like a funeral.”

Host: He spoke without looking up. The screen’s glow reflected faintly in his tired eyes.

Jeeny: “You sound like a man counting ghosts.”

Jack: “That’s business, Jeeny. You chase profit, or you’re dead. Everything else is poetry.”

Jeeny: “And yet, W. Edwards Deming said, ‘Profit in business comes from repeat customers, customers that boast about your product or service, and that bring friends with them.’ Not from spreadsheets, Jack.”

Host: Jack finally looked up, one eyebrow raised.

Jack: “Deming was a statistician, Jeeny. He believed in systems, not sentiment. Even his definition of loyalty came from numbers.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. His numbers were human. He understood what most forget—that profit is just a reflection of trust.”

Jack: “Trust doesn’t pay bills.”

Jeeny: “It’s the only thing that keeps them paid.”

Host: Her words landed softly, but they carried weight. Outside, a taxi splashed through a puddle, the sound filling the brief silence that followed.

Jack: “You really think trust and loyalty can keep a company alive in a world like this? People don’t care, Jeeny. They swipe, they scroll, they move on. You’ve got about three seconds of attention before they vanish.”

Jeeny: “Then give them something they don’t want to vanish from.”

Host: Jack leaned back, his jaw tightening, the faint hum of the diner’s fridge filling the pause.

Jack: “You talk like someone who’s never had to meet payroll.”

Jeeny: “And you talk like someone who’s forgotten why he started a business in the first place.”

Host: The tension thickened. A waitress passed by, refilling their cups, pretending not to notice.

Jack: “I started to make something real. But reality costs money. You can’t pay your employees with goodwill.”

Jeeny: “No, but you can’t keep them without it either.”

Host: Her eyes softened, but her voice carried the fire of conviction.

Jeeny: “People don’t just buy what you sell, Jack. They buy who you are. The baker who remembers their name, the tailor who listens, the company that cares when it doesn’t have to—that’s what lasts.”

Jack: “Idealism. Nice in stories. Terrible in boardrooms.”

Jeeny: “Tell that to Apple, to Patagonia, to Toyota. Deming’s ideas built them. He taught that quality isn’t about perfection—it’s about consistency, humanity, and respect.”

Jack: “You’re quoting textbooks.”

Jeeny: “No, I’m quoting survival.”

Host: The light flickered above them. A drop of rain slid down the window, tracing the reflection of Jack’s face. He looked away.

Jack: “You really believe people remember kindness over cost?”

Jeeny: “Always. They might forget what they bought, but they’ll never forget how they felt buying it.”

Host: Her tone softened, becoming almost a whisper. “That’s the difference between a transaction and a relationship.”

Jack: “Relationships don’t scale.”

Jeeny: “Neither does integrity—but both build empires.”

Host: A faint smile tugged at her lips as she said it. Jack’s eyes narrowed, not in anger but in thought. He stared out the window at the glowing signs across the street—brands shouting for attention, all of them blending into the same noise.

Jack: “You know, I used to believe that. When I opened my first store. I’d talk to every customer. I remembered their kids’ names. Then growth happened. The more we grew, the less we knew.”

Jeeny: “And that’s when you stopped growing.”

Jack: “We hit record profits that year.”

Jeeny: “And then?”

Jack: “Then they stopped coming back.”

Host: The admission came quietly, as if torn from somewhere deep. The rain outside intensified, streaking the glass like a confession written in water.

Jeeny: “Profit’s not the finish line, Jack. It’s the echo of something done right.”

Jack: “And what’s that something?”

Jeeny: “Caring.”

Host: She said it simply, without drama. Jack stared at her for a long moment, then laughed, the sound low, tired, but not cruel.

Jack: “You make it sound like business is a moral crusade.”

Jeeny: “It is. Every time you sell something, you make a promise. The question is whether you intend to keep it.”

Host: Jack rubbed the back of his neck, his fingers trembling slightly.

Jack: “You really think that’s what Deming meant?”

Jeeny: “Yes. He wasn’t just talking about customer retention. He was talking about human retention. About creating something worth belonging to.”

Host: A silence settled between them, warm this time. The noise of rain softened, replaced by the faint hum of an old jazz song playing from the kitchen radio.

Jack: “You know, when I started out, my father told me something similar. He said, ‘Son, business is just a way of keeping promises to strangers.’ I laughed at him.”

Jeeny: “Maybe it’s time you stopped laughing.”

Host: Jack smiled faintly, his eyes distant.

Jack: “Funny. The first product I ever sold wasn’t the best one on the market. But the customer came back every week. Said I made him feel like his money mattered.”

Jeeny: “There it is.”

Jack: “There what is?”

Jeeny: “The profit you can’t measure.”

Host: The rain stopped. The window’s reflection cleared, and the city lights shimmered clean once again.

Jack leaned back, closing his laptop.

Jack: “Maybe I’ve been looking at the wrong kind of numbers.”

Jeeny: “You’ve been looking at the results, not the reasons.”

Host: He looked at her then, really looked, as if seeing her not as an idealist but as someone holding up a mirror he’d been too afraid to face.

Jack: “You’re dangerous, you know that?”

Jeeny: “Only to cynics.”

Host: They both laughed, the tension dissolving into quiet warmth. The waitress brought them the check but didn’t rush them—some conversations deserve to linger.

Jack glanced once more at the glowing screen of his laptop, then closed it for good.

Jack: “You know what, Jeeny? Tomorrow, I’m calling every one of our top customers myself. No emails. No surveys. Just a phone call. To thank them.”

Jeeny: “That’s where profit starts, Jack. In gratitude.”

Host: Outside, the rain began to lift, the streetlights glistening against the wet pavement. The world looked cleaner, softer—like something rediscovered.

As they stood to leave, Jack looked back at the booth, the half-empty cups, the glow of the old clock still frozen in time.

Host: For a moment, he understood what Deming had meant—not just about business, but about life: that true profit comes not from what we take, but from what we build that makes others come back.

The door opened. The city breathed.

And the sound of footsteps disappeared into the night, leaving behind the faint echo of something both practical and profound—
the mathematics of care.