New year greetings! I hope you enjoyed the holiday season. I must say I’m glad the task of finding suitable and thoughtful presents is over for a while. It’s fun when you think of something original to give; less fun is choosing from a huge array of options.

Psychologists believe that we prefer fewer shopping choices because there’s less risk of confusion, regret and anxiety. In a study at Columbia University, one group of customers was presented with a choice of 24 varieties of jam, another with just six. Some 30% of those offered fewer varieties were prepared to make a purchase, compared to just 3% of those given an abundance of options. I wrote the following in 2002:

Choice

They think we’ll rejoice, offered infinite choice,
But in fact more is less; indecision means stress.
How did they ever think it was clever
To propose the adoption of every damned option
Under the sun, instead of just one?

Just take the car, where they’ve gone far too far.
Do I have to recap the ten types of hubcap
The number of doors, colored carpets on floors,
Different colors and trims and personalized shims,
When out on the road all the cars look alike.
Henry Ford, hurry back and offer just black!

Take the cereals on offer: a hundred they proffer,
And do so in aisles stretching out there for miles.
Vitamins added; beware the array
Or you’ll quickly be glutted in C, D and A.
If you read all the labels, ingredient tables,
I very much fear it would be a career.

Hi-tech sort of gear is a category where
They include lots of stuff that you don’t use enough,
Or remember it’s there, or particularly care.
The shops you buy through mostly haven’t a clue;
And I’ll have a good bet that you’ll quickly forget
What buttons to press, and you’ll just have to guess.

Oh, take me back home where the buffaloes roam,
Where you rock in your chair in fresh air with no care,
Where in the boondocks the shops have small stocks,
And you’re settled and done with a “choice” of just one;
And you buy your provisions with no endless decisions,
Just a simple invoice and no multiple choice.

So who’s going to tell the people who sell
That we’re doing just fine without over-design?
Who’s going to complain: “Keep it simple and plain”.
Let it do just one task, that’s all that we ask.”
I have just made a start: “Give us less a la carte!”
Come, you too can rejoice with more time and less choice.