582 THE PRINCIPLES OF SELF-CREATION
The garment was originally priced at fifty dollars, and of course
it had to be thrown on the bargain counter and sold for whatever it
would bring, but the keen student of human nature will understand
that the Field's store not only did not lose anything on the garment
but it actually profited by the transaction to an extent that cannot be
measured in mere dollars.
The woman who returned the garment knew that she was not
entitled to a refund. Therefore, when the store gave her that to which
she was not entitled, the transaction won her as a permanent customer
and she then spread the news of the "fair treatment" she had received
at the Field's store. The store received more advertising from that trans-
action than it could have purchased in any other way with ten times
the value of the returned garment.
The success of the Field's store was built largely on Marshall Field's
understanding of the law of increasing returns, which had prompted
him to adopt, as a part of his business policy, the slogan "The customer
is always right:'
COMMENTARY
Napoleon Hill's example of the Marshall Field's policy once again demonstrates
how he was able to anticipate the coming of the service industry that grew to
dominate American business by the last half of the twentieth century. In the
1920s, when he predicted the success of the Field's policy, a visit to most retail
stores was far from what it is today. They were "business establishments" and
were just about as friendly as that austere term implies. Customers were not so
much "served" as tolerated.
But by the middle of the twentieth century, "the customer is always right"
was practically the watchword of American business. Today there are few depart-
ment stores, clothing chains, grocery chains, or even direct mail or e-commerce
businesses that don't routinely accept returns, no questions asked.