Dreams carry entrepreneurs to work hard, have faith in their projects and to persevere, but what if it is not enough? Entrepreneurs tend to be never satisfied with what they have and believe it can always be done bigger or better. Tucker is an example of having big dreams with little knowledge of the market in the industry. In the nineteen forties, Tucker believed he could produce something new in the automobile industry. He thought of innovative aspects to a car that the future of consumers were going to seek after in what could satisfy their needs. However, what he did not acknowledge was the competition of the market he was about to join. This being the pre-decline of Detroit's automobile industry, the big three car manufacturers (Ford, General Motors and Chrysler) had a strong hold of what American consumers considered the ideal car. Tucker realized he had to give the customer what they valued most. That being their lives and the safety of their vehicle.
Tucker then began to use specialization of employees to create a team responsible enough to create a prototype for a grand reveal. Specialization can create the most efficiency out of the workers you are given to complete a task. An individual from the Air Force drove to consult Tucker, and wanted to join the design department after briefly chatting. Tucker gave him the role of running the design department because he knew he fit best in that field, and he could get the most productivity out of him there. Entrepreneurs should use interpersonal connections to strategize an efficient plan for production at the best rate possible. This is what Adam Smith believed in his “Division of Labor” . Once the team was assembled, Tucker focused more on selling stock than a finalized business plan because the board of directors wanted to ensure he would raise enough money for manufacturing. Without a viable business plan it is easy for an entrepreneur to get ahead of himself in the production process, and that is what happened. An important board member Bennington began changing the iconic aspects of Tucker’s vehicle to decrease the higher anticipated cost. These aspects are what differentiated it from all the other vehicles being made in Detroit and created an innovation that was wanted. Hundreds of letters were received exclaiming customers' high demand. This fuels a fire in an entrepreneur's product. Innovation was created and then destroyed before the market could even consume it. Without these design aspects, what would create its value compared to other vehicles on the market. The top three companies were receiving their steel for half the price as Tucker’s company, so they could create value at a cheaper price. This gave them a comparative advantage to Tucker. This was a demand in the market’s resources Tucker was unaware of before it was already too late. An entrepreneur must analyze supplies and demands in a market before any money is wasted on such. With more money being spent on the steel, it will create opportunity costs he cannot fulfill because the money is being used elsewhere.
Tucker did not thoroughly evaluate his options well throughout his company. He was unhappy in his previous business because it did not line with his dreams of creating his own automobile. This is where the entrepreneur needs to reevaluate their goals with the obtainable wants of consumers. Tucker knew that the opportunity costs for creating this vehicle could include much safer options, but he chased a dream. Tucker was simply too focused on the “seen” than the “unseen”. This time and energy could have been implemented into his last company or possibly a whole new one. An entrepreneur's goal of becoming successful is through satisfying customers' wants and not their own. Sometimes these wants are through solving problems that already exist or are environmentally created. The senator told Tucker that, “problems are just opportunities in work clothes'', and he is right in that sense. Problems can be caused by destruction or just a lack of innovation, but the concept of fixing a problem brings satisfaction. Tucker’s idea was simply to fix a problem until the “big businesses closed the door on the little guy with an idea.” An entrepreneur should never underestimate the power of an industry's control on resources. These factors should be considered when evaluating opportunity costs because that is the premise of optionality. The ending expresses when one opportunity shuts down, another one was there the whole time.
