what happen when we return a method

When a method returns a value you can use it. Example the gets method returns a string and you can do anything you want with that string....some times you assign that string to variable. Imagine if the add method could return the result of sum you can declare a variable and store the result of that sum. Imagine you have a method that makes a bigger math operation and then you need that value to make other math operation.

Lets say you have a basic product class like so:

class Product
    attr_accessor :description, :price

    def initialize(description, price)
        @description = description
        @price = price
    end 
end

product = Product.new("Skateboard", 10.99)
puts "$#{product.price}"
puts product.description

Now I want add a method that removes a dollar from the price of our product when we initialize it.

class Product
    attr_accessor :description, :price

    def initialize(description, price)
        @description = description
        @price = add_discount(price)
    end 

    def add_discount(price)
        adjusted_price = price - 1
        return adjusted_price
    end

end

product = Product.new("Skateboard", 10.99)
puts "$#{product.price}"
puts product.description

Whats happening here is when we set our @price instance variable, we are running our add discount method and passing it the original price and it is returning the adjusted price back to our @price variable. Thats essentially what return does, it passes a value back to the place where the method was called (in this case @price)

Thats the best way I can think of explaining my understanding of it, in context. I hope that makes sense and isn't a totally useless answer!