If you build it, they will come

Origin of: If you build it, they will come

If you build it, they will come

Since the 1990s, this quotation has become a business mantra meaning that if you make an investment and build something, people will come, use it, and eventually pay for it. As such, it contradicts a basic marketing principle, namely that one must establish a need for something before making it. Thus, it appears to be a production-orientated mantra rather than a needs-based one. Nevertheless it is an often heard and often used mantra. It is actually a misquotation because the source is the 1989 movie Field of Dreams, in which the lead character played by Kevin Costner hears a voice in his corn field say, “If you build it, he will come.” The ‘it’ refers to a baseball field and it is all a fantasy in that the ‘he’ is a long-dead but famous baseball player idolised by the lead character. Anyway, the corn field is ploughed up, the baseball field gets built and the ghostly baseball players from the past do indeed come. The entire movie is a metaphor for pursuing one’s dreams, no matter how bizarre. Much the same thought is taken up by national lotteries who advertise, “If you don’t play, you can’t be a winner.”