But in real life, by the time you received orders for N/2 widgets, you were already breaking ground on your next factory. And if you get an order for 100N, you

But in real life, by the time you received orders for N/2 widgets, you were already breaking ground on your next factory. And if you get an order for 100N, you smile because now you can switch to a higher productivity manufacturing method, like stamping instead of machining; at 10000N you can invest in mass-producing the machines-that-make-the-machines. This is how we end up being able to make even complex products like cars so cheaply that we have more cars than people.