Quote from ByLoSellHi:
Guys and ladies, true story:
When Sergei Federov first arrived in the U.S. to play for the Detroit Red Wings, after defecting from the former U.S.S.R., and during the time Mike Illitch of Little Caesar's was putting together the Red Wing Dynasty built on the back of Soviet players -
- he went to the store with his assistant to shop for basic stuff like shampoo and food, and he had a panic attack and had to leave the store in a hurry. He literally could not comprehend or filter the number of brands and filter the choices he had to make. It was overwhelming to him.
He told Mitch Albom later on that 'in the Sovier Union, we had one shampoo, one soap. No decision making was necessary. Now I had to dedicate time to making choices on the most trivial of things. There were 40 or 50 different shampoos, plus 30 conditioners. It was completely foreign, as if I had landed on a different planet, and it was stressful and overwhelming.'
It took him years to even find his comfort zone. The whole team would laugh because whent he Soviet players did spend their money, aside from necessities like homes and things like that, it was on bizarre things.
There is a great book speaking to this dilemna called 'The Paradox of Choice.'
We don't fully appreciate it because we're steeped in marketing and targeted by advertisers from the moment we emerge into the world.
