One friend recently opened a bookstore instead of a bookmobile.

Another is investing two years of his life to open a restaurant instead of a series of pop up dinners.

And a third is buying a boat instead of chartering one.

It’s easy to see why. A real bookstore has a lease. They post their hours. It’s solid.

And a real restaurant, the kind we’ve all been to, looks, feels and smells like a restaurant.

Leaving the ridiculous economics of boat ownership aside, it’s worth taking a look at the first two.

The key questions are:

  1. what asset are you building?
  2. what is the purpose of the thing you’re building?
  3. who is taking a risk and who is getting the upside?

If the asset of the future is trust and attention, then it’s easy to do a new calculation. The purpose of getting a lease and a place on Main Street was to momentarily get the attention of passers by–and to earn their trust. After all, you’ve got a building.

But when we shift to a permission asset, when we cherish attention and use it to build trust over time, being on Main Street might not be the best way to achieve this.

The landlord gets paid regardless of whether the space does the job, and the upside is limited by the size of the space.

What happens to the life of a chef when they have 6,000 people who eagerly read their popup updates? When each person comes to two or three dinners a year, each held at a fascinating location, rented just for the night…

Instead of finding diners for their restaurant, they could create dining experiences for their diners.

The bookstore? Imagine a route, a series of partnerships with 50 or 100 organizations that value information and exploration. A curated selection of 400 books, ready to roll out at a community center, church or school…

In both cases, the hard work is earning attention and trust. It’s easy to avoid that when you’re passively sitting in a leased space waiting for people to come to you.

This applies to musicians, filmmakers or anyone who seeks to create magic.

Earn attention and trust. Spend time and money on that, and the rest will take care of itself.