Yesterday, I was listening to a podcast with the founder of Mid-day Squares, a company that manufactures and sells chocolate bars.

The founder talked about how they chose to own the manufacturing and distribution as well rather than just focus on branding and outsource the manufacturing and distribution as there are several larger players that could do this at a lower cost for them.

That lower cost would come at the price of flexibility to manufacture things their way, though, due to their lower order volumes compared to more established chocolate brands.

In general, as a business and as individuals, signing up to do the hard things is to bet on a high risk / high reward model. 

If we're able to successfully pull off the hard thing we pick, then that helps in differentiating ourselves from the rest of the crowd and helps build a moat that is hard to replicate. 

If we don't manage to pull it off, then we lose the safety of mediocrity that would have come with an easier path.

There is no high reward in choosing the easier path.

Harder is better.