The Waiting Game Winners
Update: 2025-09-24
Description
Americans spend 37 billion hours a year waiting—about 118 hours per person—but smart brands are turning that dead time into delight. In this episode of Marginally Better, Joe Taylor, Jr. breaks down the psychology of waiting (why underpromising and overdelivering works, why occupied time feels shorter, and why fairness matters), and shows how Disney, Trader Joe’s, Apple launch lines, and a Melbourne bakery with a 45-minute croissant queue convert waits into community, anticipation, and loyalty. If you can’t always shorten the line, you can always make it worth it—here’s how.
Episode Links:
Episode Links:
- Harvard Business Review - When Providing Wait Times, It Pays to Underpromise and Overdeliver
- The Psychology of Waiting Lines
- Customer Experience and Perceived Wait Time Study
- Scientific Research Publishing - Queue Psychology and Social Behavior
- INFORMS Operations Research - Perspectives on Queues
- Exploring the Science of Waiting
- Waitwhile - Consumer Survey: Waiting in Line 2023
- Waitwhile - Consumer Survey: Waiting in Line 2024
- Faster Lines - The Science of Waiting Lines
- How Improper Queue Management Affects Financial Results
- Queue-it - Disney Queue Psychology
- Disney Patent Dynamic Management Virtual Queues
- ResearchGate - Disney's Virtual Queues: A Strategic Opportunity
- Top Disney World Queues That Are Fun to Wait In
- The Best Queues to Wait In at Walt Disney World
- Wharton Women - Trader Joe's Strategy
- 5 Lessons Trader Joe's Can Teach
- Lines, Queuing Theory, and Small Business
- Why Do Humans Queue?
- Why Long Lines Can Be Good for Business
- How Artificial Waiting Enhances User Anticipation
- Behind the Scenes Marketing Tricks
- Application of Queuing Theory to Fast Food
- Waiting Line Effect in Technology-Enabled Restaurant Ordering
- Queue-it - Psychology of Queuing
- Qminder - Queue Psychology: Reduce Time
- Make Waiting More Bearable
- CX Journey - The State of Waiting in Line
- Disneyland to the DMV: Why We Hate Waiting
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