How American Airlines saved $40,000 by removing a single olive from first-class meals - and what you can learn from it.

In the 1980s, American Airlines was under pressure to cut costs - without compromising service.

Executives combed through line items, looking for savings that wouldn’t be noticed by passengers.

Eventually, someone spotted a curious detail in the catering budget. The olives.

By removing just one olive from the salads in first class, the airline saved $40,000 a year.

It sounds ridiculous. But it worked.

No complaints.

No loyalty lost.

Margins improved - quietly.

And that’s the point:

The biggest wins often don’t come from bold moves - they come from small, strategic subtractions.

We’re conditioned to look for what to add - more tools, more hires, more products, more channels.

But the most overlooked lever in business is removal.

The small stuff no one questions.

The inefficiencies hiding in plain sight.

The extra step. The duplicated work.

The meeting that could’ve been a Loom.

This isn’t about olives. It’s about compounding leverage.

Here’s what that looks like in practice:

🔹 Automate one weekly admin task → unlocks a full month of labour per year
🔹 Change delivery routing → cuts fuel and overtime with zero extra effort
🔹 Bulk order materials → reduces costs and avoids supplier delays

No single change transforms the business.

But stack ten of them?

You get margin. You get time. You get clarity.

Small changes. Repeated. Layered.

Find your olive - and do it across every part of the business.

Most people chase silver bullets.

But real momentum comes from small, strategic removals that free up growth further down the chain.