by: Geoff Ficke

Almost every person in the world takes a certain pride in being a reasonable person. They will make prudent choices based on their background and attitudes. The safe decision minimizes the chances of being wrong. No one likes to be wrong.

The safe decision, however, carries little upside reward benefits. You are expected to pay your bills. Pay your taxes. Drive responsibly. Not yell fire in a theatre. Doing these things nets you no special extras.

All of the great ideas or advances in history have evolved from unsafe, unconventional ideas. The non-conventional idea always offers the higher reward, as well as higher risk. It is not the norm to be unsafe. It takes vision and confidence in the face of the usual chorus of criticism, doubters and opponents.

George Bernard Shaw said:
“The reasonable man adapts to the world.
The unreasonable man adapts the world to him.
All progress depends on unreasonable man”.

I concur. We all know men that were unconventional thinkers before their time. Thomas Edison, Leonard Firestone, the Wright Brothers, Da Vinci, Machiavelli, Levi Strauss, William Wrigley, Colonel Sanders, Saint Augustine, Bill Gates and so many more: these are examples of visionary men that thought outside the box to the benefit of all humankind. Their products, philosophies and advances were considered of dubious value when created. They were considered small thinkers and creators of insignificance, until the world turned their little ideas into big ideas with great fame and/or riches to follow.

Think of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Tens of millions of little boys have played baseball since the game was invented in the mid-19th century. Only about 12,000 men have ever played in the Major Leagues. This is a great achievement. Nevertheless, only a few hundred of these 12,000 are enshrined in the Hall of Fame, the ultimate sign of success. This honor is reserved for greatness. These are the players that generations remember.

Unconventional, unsafe, unpopular ideas that lead to ultimate success are the concepts we remember. Christopher Columbus is a major figure in history for reasons we all know. The Royal Spanish court was inclined originally to have him interned for heresy for claiming the world was round. Ultimately he convinced Queen Isabella to let him prove his theory and bring riches to the court. His success against huge odds is an excellent example of unsafe thinking leading to great entrepreneurial success for him and Spain.

Amerigo Vespucci arrived in the new-world second and, even though America is a turn on his name, he is a footnote in history. Martin Luther is famous still for his organizing the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. The Hugenots, another Protestant sect, followed later in France. Who founded the Hugenots? Who remembers? It does not pay to be a follower.

Throughout history there are examples such as these where a person went out on a limb and society ultimately enjoyed the benefits. Safe decisions and following the crowd do not create opportunity.

Abraham Lincoln was a leader willing to broach unsafe thought. The mere idea that the Union could be sundered by the idea of freeing men from bondage seems absurd today. That a civil war resulted was a terrible price to pay. But Lincoln knew that slavery was vile and unsustainable for a modern, moral growing country. He is revered ‘til this day for his honesty, courage and steadfastness.

Fred Smith founded FedEx, the overnight package delivery service, with a very unsafe, unconventional idea. He wanted to take on Big Brother, the Federal Government, the classic snail mail service subsidized and delivered by the United States Post Office. He faced unimaginable hurdles. Huge capital formation needs, access to commercial airports, hard fixed overheads, licensing, etc. were huge barriers to entry. The idea was panned. He started with one, very used plane.

Mr. Smith knew he had identified a niche that was completely under-served and corporations would stampede to utilize. The disruptive innovations FedEx created have severely smacked the USPO with a dose of reality. FedEx is so successful that it has emboldened competitors to enter the field (the highest form of flattery: copying). During the Katrina disaster in New Orleans the USPO was delivering mail after five weeks. FedEx was delivering needed medicines and supplies for the relief workers after three days.

Not many sports fans today remember the name Dick Fosbury. Entering the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City no one paid much attention to Mr. Fosbury’s chances. He was a high jumper that had never jumped very high. Nevertheless a competitive spirit brewed quietly inside him. He knew he could jump higher, be competitive and, maybe, win a medal. He was on nobody’s short list of favorites.

Mr. Fosbury decided to take an unusual approach. In a sport hidebound by ancient training techniques and approaches to performance enhancement, he went WAY OUT on a limb. Mr. Fosbury decided to approach and elevate toward the jump bar by gliding with his back to the ground. No one had ever seen such a flop as all prior jumpers approached and attempted to leap feet first. The Fosbury Flop was born.

People laughed, sportswriters had a field day and competitors snickered, for awhile. During practices, however, keen observers began to notice that Mr. Fosbury was jumping higher, much higher. It was too late for the competition to adjust and to everyone’s astonishment, the Fosbury Flop delivered the Gold Medal to Mr. Fosbury. To this day, this is the accepted jump style used to deliver the best results in the event. This is just another example of a person seizing an opportunity by thinking outside of the box.

There is no Hall of Fame for safe ideas or average people. We honor and reward people that advance civilization by implementing ideas and concepts that seemed unnecessary, even silly, at the time of invention. Bill Gate’s mother once said to him as she tried to convince him to return to Harvard, “but why would anyone need a computer in the home”? The risk takers become the reward makers when their weird, unfashionable ideas become the norm.

by: Geoff Ficke
Whatever happened to the Stanley Steamer automobile? From the production of Stanley’s first model in 1897, the Company outsold every other firm that produced internal combustion powered vehicles until the brands demise in 1924. The Steamers were safe, durable and easily maintained. So what killed the Stanley Steamer?

The Stanley Automobile Company was founded by twin brothers Francis and Freelan Stanley. The cars gained fame when a model set the world land speed record in 1906, covering one mile in 28.2 seconds. The early Steamers enjoyed a solid performance advantage over the primitive gasoline powered cars of the era.

The Stanley brothers enjoyed a sterling reputation at that time for producing cutting edge product, both from a design and engineering standpoint. Then a grievous error was made: they fell in love with their product. Steam was soon to become obsolete as a source of power. Improved internal combustion technology made the gasoline-powered car much cheaper than the Stanley Steamer. By the end of its useful life in 1924 the Stanley Steamer sold for $3950, while the Ford Model T retailed for $500.

The invention of the electric starter was another heavy blow that the Stanley Steamer could not overcome. Early internal combustion engine powered cars were started with a hand crank. The crank was notorious for causing injury and made starting a car almost impossible for women.

As the sales model for the automobile adjusted to the realities of mass production the Stanley’ brothers remained adherents of the costly steam generated power train. In desperation, seeking to halt the sales slide that their cars endured, they produced an advertising campaign that sought to instill fear and doubt about the safety of the internal combustion engine.

This marketing campaign was one of the earliest examples of negative advertising and the results were abysmal. “Power-Correctly Controlled, Correctly Generated, Correctly Applied to the rear axle” surely goes down in history as one of the most cumbersome, dull, forgettable branding statements or advertising campaign slogans of all time. The purpose of these ads was not to sell the advantages of the Stanley Steamer, but to instill doubt in consumers minds about the safety of the internal combustion engine.

Because Stanley did not continually keep ahead of rapidly advancing automotive technology, the Company’s Steamer cars were obsolete and the firm closed its doors in 1924. This is a classic example of how a market leader can rapidly lose the advantages built up so carefully over years and quickly be pushed into the dust bin of history.

Sad stories about products and Companies like the Stanley Automobile Company are commonplace. Virtually every industry and product category experiences such examples of churn, decline, destruction and new startups arising to fill space deserted by fallen stars. Marketers must always assume that competition is working relentlessly to overcome any advantage that they might currently enjoy and are seeking to replace their products with newer, fresher designs and technology. To not be fearful of the unknown is much more than unwise, it is stupid!

by: Geoff Ficke
Along with duct tape, probably the most common product handymen keep in the garage for tackling household chores and repairs is the ubiquitous lubricant spray WD-40. I am a mechanical klutz. But when something needs fixing in my home, I simplistically grab the duct tape or a can of WD-40 for use in my first line of attacking the problem at hand.

WD-40 is a classic example of a product innovation that defines the persistence required of successful inventors and entrepreneurs when facing hurdles. WD-40 was invented by the three owners of the Rocket Specialty Chemical Company of San Diego. The team was attempting to develop a product that would prevent corrosion on aircraft and aerospace components. It was first successfully used on the Atlas missile.

Norm Larsen is the scientist most often credited with inventing the essential molecular formula necessary to perfect the superior lubricating properties of WD-40. WD-40’s famous navy blue spray can, with the yellow shield and red plastic closure is one of the most recognizable consumer product packages in modern marketing. Initially WD-40 was sold solely for industrial uses. The original aerosol can presentation of WD-40 was introduced into the consumer product marketplace in 1958 and has sold strongly ever since.

Most interesting is the provenance of the brand name, WD-40. The W stands for water. The D stands for displacement. The number 40 represents the number of experiments Mr. Larsen conducted to perfect the chemical formula necessary to produce WD-40. How many people give up on a task long before they make 40, or 30, or 20, or 3 stabs at finding a proof for a problem?

This level of commitment and the passion for finding answers to difficult hurdles is endemic in all successful product creators. Larsen and his Rocket Specialty Chemical Company team, I am sure, would have made 140 more attempts to find the answers they were seeking. The reward for their efforts was a wonderful product that decades later is still enriching their estates and making neophyte DIY practitioners like myself a little better at successfully completing their chores.

by: Geoff Ficke

Successful business owners tend to approach fanaticism in nurturing every aspect of their enterprise. They work longer hours than their employees, take the work home with them, sacrifice leisure and relaxation as they obsess over their competitors and continually seek new systems and innovation to expand their shop. They are rewarded by receiving the respect of their peers, providing a comfortable lifestyle for their families and their employee’s families and participating in the social fabric of the community in which they operate.

The erudite Spanish critic and philosopher George Santayana once wrote, “Fanaticism consists in redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim”.

When things go cockeye in any enterprise, the only opportunity the group will have to right their ship is to look at history and recalibrate. What made them successful? What did their customers reward with support? Where did they fall off the rails?

History is resplendent in examples of organizations that lost their way. Those that “forgot their aim” either redoubled their efforts at getting back to their original success path or were consumed by their mistakes. Empires such as the Hohenzollerns, Romanov, Bourbons and Hapsburgs expired as times changed and they didn’t. The Royal houses of Great Britain, Holland, Sweden and Denmark, however, recalibrated in the face of modern democracy and adjusted to the times and still enjoy their thrones and a large measure of popularity with their subjects.

In World War II the Russian army was initially invaded, pummeled, mauled and demoralized by the German invaders. However, the Red Army adjusted, replaced their general officer corps; devised new strategies and weapons systems that were purpose built to fight the Nazi menace. After a grueling series of embarrassing defeats the Soviets finally were able to absorb the Nazi push at Moscow and slowly turned the tide. Changing strategies lead to the Russians seizing Berlin at the end of the war and complete vanquishing of Hitler’s forces.

Contrast this result with the inflexible strategy executed by the Imperial Russian army in World War I. The Russians simply sent waves of under-equipped, starving, freezing peasant soldiers in waves to be slaughtered by well dug in, well armed, well-provisioned German divisions. The disgust that these soldiers felt at being used as cannon fodder lead directly to mass mutiny and the opportunity for Communists to seize the government and control of the army. After pulling back and virtually surrendering to the Germans, the newly entrenched Bolshevik government seized the Romanov family and murdered them.

There are many examples of religious movements, charities and businesses that did not adapt to changing times user tastes or styles. Islam has lasted for centuries while Zoroastroism and Coptic Christianity have virtually become extinct in the Middle East. Animism is on the decline in Africa even as Roman Catholicism and Evangelical Christianity groups convert large numbers of people across Africa.

The Salvation Army and Catholic charities enjoy sustained growth while the United Appeal and Red Cross, while still important, have been hurt by scandal.

The most starkly obvious examples of groups losing their way can be found in the business world. Look at listed stock equities that made up the Dow Jones Industrial Average in the 1930’s. Only Standard Oil (Exxon), Procter & Gamble, Dupont and United Technologies (United Aircraft) remain from the original list of blue chip companies that defined American industrial might. How did so many formerly stellar performers fall by the commercial way side.

The most stunning fall, and most relevant to contemporary observers is General Motors. Former GM Chairman Charlie Wilson once famously said, “What is good for General Motors is good for the United States”. GM was synonymous with American industrial might and was a symbol of American strength, creativity and the good life.

GM was assembled in the 1920’s and 1930’s by the management innovator Alfred Sloan. By taking Chevrolet, Pontiac, Buick, Oldsmobile and Cadillac and creating stair step marketing Mr. Sloan targeted an automotive nameplate at every demographic group. Young families started with Chevrolet and as their economic situation improved they moved up the ladder of brands to Buick and later Cadillac.

The loyalty this strategy created was reinforced by constant fresh styling cues.

GM design was personified by the brilliant craftsmanship and coach design of Harley Earl. Mr. Earl had a signature style that came to scream GM, cutting edge, beauty and created consumer desire for being seen driving GM cars.

As late as the 1970’s over half of all vehicles sold in America were produced by GM. Then a series of events occurred which caught the behemoth corporation flat footed, bloated and unable, unwilling and without the guile necessary to change direction and adapt to changing market realities. A long, slow, inevitable decline has resulted in the implosion of GM, bankruptcy and shedding important component divisions that will forever hamper the company’s ability to compete with more nimble competitors.

GM has failed. It is the butt of late night comedian’s jokes. Sales have cratered and Government Motors is out of most consumers mind when considering a new vehicle purchase. The demise of GM has occurred even as agile competitors from Europe, Japan, Korea and China see their growth accelerating. The necessary value retention, durability, warranty, performance, fuel economy and styling that GM did not address has been committed too with gusto by the competition.

Brands like Toyota, Hyundai, Fiat, Honda, BMW, and Chery have recognized what consumers want and provide these features and benefits at prices that GM could not match. GM did not redouble efforts to provide consumers with true value in exciting packages. The competitors have.

GM is now trying to reinvent the corporation. All Americans hope they can. However, the deck is as stacked against GM as it was against Studebaker, Hudson, Crosley, Nash, Stutz, Pierce Arrow, Dusenberg and Hupmobile.

GM, like so many other enterprises, lost their aim. They did not redouble their efforts to please their formerly loyal consumers until far too late in the game. This is a crippling malady that is most difficult to overcome. The fanaticism of Harley Earl, Alfred Sloan, Charley Wilson and Zora Arkus-Duntoff (creator of the Corvette) has been missing for too long. The Cadillac Cimarron is a symbol of a legacy short on passion and fanaticism and long on lethargy and mismanagement.

Every entrepreneur can take an important lesson from the horrific demise of this fallen American industrial icon. Passion can never lessen. Stay focused while being astute in keeping abreast of changing consumer tastes is essential. As tastes change, you must adjust. The fanaticism you bring to your enterprise will enable you to succeed initially, but redoubling efforts is key to maintaining growth and long term viability.

by: Geoff Ficke

Since the beginning of time, until the middle of the 19^th century the production of goods was conducted on an artisan, piece by piece basis. Over these many centuries the center of the individual’s universe was the local environ where commerce and enterprise were conducted on a small scale, often bartered basis. The idea of mass production was impossible to fathom. People predominantly lead lives of tremendous struggle and burden simply trying to subsist in an agrarian centric world with few hard goods produced other than tools, rudimentary clothing and dwellings.

In Europe in the Middle Ages the creation of guilds resulted in specialized production of goods. The members of a specific guild would concentrate on producing bricks, tool making, construction, metal work, shipping, etc. These were the precursor organizations to modern unions. They controlled who and how many could become guild members. The guilds fixed wages and prices. They were usually licensed or appointed by host governments in return for acceding to local laws, taxes and regulations.

In the early 18^th century in France there began a movement among factory owners seeking to create more streamlined, profitable means of production. The idea of modern mass production was still almost a century away. In order to organize large scale industrial production sources of interchangeable, purpose built parts would be required. This did not yet exist.

In the late 18^th century, French gunsmith Honore Blanc proposed to the French army that he mass produce muskets. To prove that he could perform as he claimed, Mr. Blanc arranged a demonstration for the armors of Napoleon’s army. Using batches of interchangeable parts Blanc quickly assembled a number of muskets. Still, at that time, muskets were built one by one, each piece turning out to have its own quirky character. Blanc had unveiled the elemental secret of mass production keyed by his use of interchangeable parts.

While acting as envoy to France during the American Revolutionary War, Thomas Jefferson visited Honore Blanc’s shop. Jefferson was a man of agriculture not industry. Nevertheless, he sent details of Blanc’s methods back to America and inadvertently helped accelerate the industrialization of his homeland.

The inventor Eli Whitney is credited with taking Honore Blanc’s techniques and applying them to mass production of machinery. Later these methods were the basis for the mass production of clothing, typewriters, stem engines, sewing machines and munitions among hundreds of other products. Whole industries were thus born and industrialization rapidly assumed preeminence as the preferred means of production.

What of Honore Blanc? By 1806 the French government decided that Blanc was a threat to the states control of the means of production and a threat to the old crafts (guilds, unions). The system of production he helped pioneer was shut down and outlawed. The French government made the inane argument that workers not crafting a complete product from start to finish could not produce harmonious products.

To this day governments all over the world fear the mobility of production. Local content laws are still common. Statutes, regulations, bureaucracies and taxes are levied to control, and often hinder, production of goods in the most efficient manner.  Certain classes of workers are protected and assisted to the disadvantage of other laborers. Winners and losers are chosen by bureaucrats who have never produced a single widget.

The ability to interchange parts is the lynchpin of modern mass production and the success of capitalism. This system of production of goods has lifted billions of people out of poverty and misery. Government revenues are almost exclusively derived from the fruits born of mass production. And yet, government invariably cannot recognize the genius of entrepreneurial organization of the means of production, the system that has produced so much, for so many, so inexpensively.

by: Geoff Ficke

Recently I was ambling around the internet, researching lecture and article topics. I stumbled onto a Wikipedia site that at first seemed quite banal: Timeline of Historic Inventions. This link offered a chronological listing of historic inventions from the Paleolithic period, through the time of Christ, the Dark Ages, Middle- Ages and on to modern times. Perusal of the listing of inventors and their inventions was interesting on several levels.

First was the attribution that could be applied by geography for the specific inventions. Cement in Egypt, rice in India, the Trebuchet in China and hundreds more hugely important inventions could be assigned as having originated in specific ancient lands. Many of these geographic locales are recognizable today, while many others, though identified, have been lost with the passage time and the disappearance of their historical importance.

Second, many of the inventors are identifiable by name, even many of the most ancient ones. Attribution for creation of the encyclopedia is given to Speusippus, the odometer to Archimedes, the kite to Lu Ban, linguistics to Panini, and plastic surgery to Shushruta.

Third, and most interesting, is the sheer volume of inventions, most of great import and use to this day that were created in ancient empires that fell from great heights and lost most remnants of their glory. The mathematics discovered in the Middle East, the medicines and surgeries pioneered on the Indian sub-continent, the vast array of defense and engineering advances created by the Chinese, the foodstuffs, trade routes and tools from Africa are only a small sample of the amazing, wealth generating advances produced by old world societies. And yet, almost inevitably, each of the lands that germinated this amazing creativity evolved into modern times in greatly diminished status.

As you scan the Wikipedia site, “Timeline of Historic Inventions” you begin to see an accelerating scamper of inventiveness from “old world”, eastern centers to the “New World”, western hemisphere. By the Middle Ages creativity has begun to blossom and explode in the west, while the ancient centers of inventiveness for almost 4000 years seem to expire.

The western inventors seem to suddenly breathe a different air. Their technology becomes more commercial, more targeted to mass production and more advanced. The ancients gave us cotton, beer, paper and sails, all useful, important and still in great use. The moderns gave the world machines that revolutionized work and enabled scale and mass production to be levers of new industry and international trade. James Watt, Leonardo da Vinci, Benjamin Franklin, Johannes Guttenberg and Galileo Galilei are but a small group of inventors who revolutionized how societies produced goods, worked, ate, learned and enjoyed leisure (for the first time).

From the 15^th century until the present day almost all of the great inventions were produced in the New World west. The formerly robust creativity of the ancient east has expired. The Indian and Chinese economies have rebounded from centuries of torpor to become modern productivity marvels, however, in almost every instance they reproduce product that is designed and invented in the west.

Why has the Middle East become insular, Africa largely a disastrous economic backwater,  Latin America consumed by corruption and poverty and so many other areas of the world beset by poverty and unending misery? Despite the current economic struggles all countries face, does anyone believe that Canada, the United States and the democracies of the European Union will not lead the world in standards of living, prosperity, longevity and freedom for the foreseeable future?

The ability to invent is crucial. However, after crafting an invention, there must be a system in place to allow for commercialization of the invention and the pursuit of reasonable profit to reward the risks undertaken to penetrate markets. This means that rule of law, property rights; protection of intellectual property (patent/trademarks/copyright law) must be codified and enforced.

Capitalism in its various forms is still the greatest generator of wealth and opportunity ever invented. Czarist and communist Russia were full of inventive citizens who were stifled by a system that did not reward innovation. When these people emigrated to the west they created new industries (movies, cosmetics, apparel, technologies, television, etc.) that made them prosperous and benefitted society by providing employment and improving lifestyles.

All over the world there are innovators seeking to escape bondage or states of despair, make their way to the “New World”, and by utilizing our system create new products and industries. We all prosper from this drive to invent. The ancients were inventors of technologies, things of value and usefulness. Unfortunately, they did not reside in places and times where lasting “rules of law” were applicable. Without these basic protections invention, individuals and societies cannot flourish. Not ever!

by: Geoff Ficke

by: Geoff Ficke

Today we know Gillette to be one of the worlds most successful and highly respected consumer product brand names. The Gillette safety razor is ubiquitous in homes all over the world. The Company is now owned by Proctor & Gamble and continues to introduce new shaving innovations on a regular basis.

by: Geoff Ficke

One wintry night in 1933, Percy Shaw found himself driving his automobile on a remote country road in England. The night was moonless; the fog hung densely and there was a persistent mixture of rain and snow belting against his windshield. The road was little more than a lane, with no signage, no shoulders, winding and curvy. Any error in judgement would be very costly indeed.

by: Geoff Ficke

We take the simplest devices for granted in our modern technologically advanced world. We turn a tap and water is delivered, hot, temperate and cold. We hit a wall switch and darkness is overcome by light. We open the refrigerator door and peer into a compartment that contains climate controlled stored foodstuffs. These conveniences are omnipresent in the developed world in the early 21^st century.

And yet, we reflect little on the simplest, most important inventions that make all forms of product possible. Consider the humble screw. Yep, the little fastening vehicle that is ubiquitous in every tool-box, do it your self pre-pack, or kitchen catchall drawer. The ability to affix two opposing elements or surfaces together and insure that their attachment is permanent is essential to the structural integrity of virtually every non-consumable product we use today.

No one knows who invented the screw. We do know that wooden screws were in use during the time of Christ. They were widely used in the Middle East in pressing grapes for wine, olive oil production and woodworking. The applicable uses for screws really did not change much until the 18^th century. Englishman James Ramsden invented the first “screw cut lathe” to mass- produce steel screws in 1770. This advance made screws more economical and their usage in industrialization processes began to increase exponentially.

In the 1930’s, Henry Philips, in response to the booming automobile industry’s need for closer tolerances, invented the Philips Head Screw. This square headed screw was a significant advance as it enabled machine tools to apply more torque to the screw head, thereby providing much tighter fit and finish between conjoined parts.

Billions of screws are now used every year in millions of applications. Screws of all sizes and metallic composition are essential to every product that we manufacture. As useful and universal as the common screw is in our lives, we never really reflect on it’s importance, it’s efficiency, it’s economy and what the world would be like without these ingenious little linkage devices.

There is a contemporary lesson here. The simple screw has made life easier and more comfortable for every consumer. Jobs are created to produce screws, distribute screws and utilize screws. Prosperity is enhanced by the usefulness of this simplest of inventions.

Many entrepreneurs and inventors seek to improve life and profit commercially by creating new innovative products. The lesson we can all learn from the plebian screw is that sometimes the most valuable, most useful concepts are the simplest. It is not necessary to re-invent the transistor or discover a new system of water desalinization to profit. Looking into your universe of work, family or play and finding a simple improvement that will benefit consumers is the easiest path to commercial success.

In my consumer product development and marketing consulting company we review hundreds of product submissions each year. The best, most commercial are inevitably the simplest. They offer the most utility for the greatest number of consumers. These concepts typically do not require re-educating the consumer, which can be a difficult and expensive proposition.

So keep it simple and apply the simple “screw” test to determine simplicity, facility, cost effectiveness and applicability. This is a wonderful template that can be transferred from an ancient product to modern inventions to determine prospects for success.