Bookstore shelves are filled with management books that stretch good metaphors to the breaking point. Business is school (the "learning organization"). Business is a machine (reengineering). Business is digital information (the "new economy"). But The Experience Economy has a more elastic organizing concept -or at least one that holds up for a few hundred pages. In this era of standardization and mass consumption, consultants Joseph Pine and James Gilmore believe, more and more people are willing to pay for memorable experiences, not just well-made products.

Today's most innovative and profitable companies, they argue, sell the theatrical rather than the tangible -experiences "rich with sensations, created within the customer, "rather than traditional commodities, goods and services. Starbucks coffeehouses, for example, didn't become almost as ubiquitous as McDonald's
because of the coffee; Americans coped for decades without someplace to spend $2.95 on a grande caramel macchiato. Rather, customers at Starbucks are paying for staged experiences, Pine and Gilmore would say. The company treats patrons to poetry on its wallpaper and tabletops, jaunty apron-clad performers
behind the espresso machine, and an interior ambience that's both cozy and slick, marked by earth tones, brushed steel and retro music (also for sale). Few people leave without feeling a little more affluent, sophisticated or jazzed.