A badly injured Confederate veteran becomes addicted to morphine. His name is John Pemberton and he is a trained pharmacist. So, he comes up with his own cure, a drink containing alcohol and cocoa leaf extract — the stuff of cocaine. It never cured Pemberton’s addiction but it became a phenomenally successful soft drink and iconic brand. You know it today as Coca-Cola. According to Harvard Business School, an estimated 30,000 new products are launched every year, and 80% of them fail. A fraction is repurposed, marketed from another angle and succeeds. We have examples.
It was once used as a surgical antiseptic, a treatment for sweaty feet and corns, a floor cleaner, and…drum roll, a cure for gonorrhea. You may have gargled with it this morning. It became successful as a remedy for bad breath. Listerine.
This started out as “Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda.” It contained lithium, a drug used in the treatment of bi-polar disorder. According to the NY Times, the 7 in the name refers to lithium’s atomic mass and the “up” is for an improved mood. 7UP.
About 80% of households have a can. It’s commonly used to protect implements from moisture and loosen screws. Originally, it was made to lubricate nuclear missiles. WD40.
During WWII rubber was rationed. An engineer tried to create a synthetic version but it didn’t work. Then a marketer put some in a plastic egg and sold it as a toy. Silly Putty. In a similar vein, soap manufacturer Cleo McVickers attempted to develop a product to clean wallpaper. It didn’t work, but kids still play with it since it was marketed as Play-Doh.
Finally, this was actually created as “textured” wallpaper. That becomes a bit strange once you learn that today, we call it Bubble Wrap.
The moral of the story is, take a second, even a third look at that failed product you have on a shelf in your garage.