ABSTRACT
A car hire firm needs a pricing policy to enable it to cope with unusual requests from customers; a distribution company has to make sure that each customer has the product they want, when they want it, where they want it. In each case, the customer wants something particular – a price, or delivery, of a particular product – but the entrepreneur needs some way of dealing with and responding to the range of customer requests. The customer wants a particular, but the entrepreneur needs the general: a general formula or general principles on which to base decisions. The customer needs arithmetic, but the entrepreneur needs algebra.
