The next free bay

At a busy car wash in Doha you do not choose who washes your car. You join the line, and when a bay opens you take it, along with whichever crew is standing there.

It is easy to resent this. Everyone has a favourite: the crew that does the wheels properly, the man who never misses the inside of the doors. Why should a paying customer not ask for him?

Because if everyone did, he would be buried and the others idle. The line for his bay would stretch onto the road while two crews waited for work. He would rush, his standard would slip, and by mid-afternoon the favourite would be the worst wash on the lot. The junior crews would never get the practice that turns them into favourites themselves. Every customer getting their pick would be paid for by every customer, a little each.

Taking the next free bay looks like having no choice. It is really a choice made once, on behalf of everyone, so that nobody has to be the one left waiting.

We have learned to treat choice as an unquestioned good: more options, more personalisation, the customer always selects. Often that is right. But some systems only work because each person gives up a small preference so the whole thing keeps moving, and the owner who insists on rotation is not being lazy or rigid.

Sometimes the line that refuses to let you pick is the one looking after you.