Start-Up Success: Break The Clocks!
When I was growing up, Mom was a great example of entrepreneurship. And, since I was an only child, I got dragged taken along for the ride (sometimes literally - she had a paper route.) Mom did pretty much anything to make ends meet. In addition to the paper route, she bred dogs; had a bookkeeping service; started an armored car biz with my Dad…and held a lot of garage sales. (Where she got the steady stream of junk, I dunno, but seems like we had one every month.)
At one sale, Mom had put out several alarm clocks. A man asked, “Are these broken?” Mom brightly replied,”Oh, no, no. They all work!” The potential customer sighed, “Oh, that’s too bad. I like to tinker with broken clocks.” Mom, without hestitating, picked up the clocks and dashed them to the garage floor (tinkle, tinkle). “Well, now they’re broken!” The man bought them all.
And so it goes. Sometimes what you think works doesn’t for your customers. And that goes for processes and high-tech products as much as it does for garage sale clocks.
Related Posts:
Can You Learn To Be an Entrepreneur?
What Do You Wanta Be When You Grow Up?
Read More:
All my entrepreneur sanity check posts
All my marketing troubleshooting posts
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Tags: marketing troubleshooting, entrepreneurshipentrepreneur sanity check, product development, customer service, success
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June 11th, 2007 at 3:03 pm
Dear Mary, I am still laughing and smiling at what your Mom did.
What an image:
Mom, without hesitating, picked up the clocks and dashed them to the garage floor (tinkle, tinkle). “Well, now they’re broken!†The man bought them all.
The customer always gets to define what relevance looks like. Your Mom knew that, oh so well.
I suppose we don’t like that notion because it means that offering relevant products and services will be a never ending quest. And that means good business is about hitting moving targets of customer defined usefulness.
Bur frankly, I like the challenge it creates. I bet you do too!
Keep creating,
Mike
June 11th, 2007 at 3:49 pm
Mike,
Indeed I do enjoy it…as long as I don’t run out of clocks!
June 12th, 2007 at 6:21 am
That’s hilarious!
Great example of thinking on your feet, I’d say!
June 13th, 2007 at 6:30 am
I just had a similar experience while peddling the quilted stretcher covers we make for funeral homes at a local convention for funeral directors.
I found that one of the features that I added to my top-of-the-line product was something no one cares about.
Because even though I thought it was a good addition, my clients never use the feature and it doesn’t help sell the product.
So I’m taking it out.
Or, smashing the alarm clock, so to speak.