@willnitze The sweet spot is to build for a niche in a way that is scalable to mass market. Solving "Niche needs" = pains that are ONLY experienced by the niche. Avoid this. "Scalable needs" = pains that are still felt by mass market. IQBAR is doing this. I screwed it up with my biz!
@chuckiegregory UndrDog looks cool, I have a hemp tee from a different brand that I like. Are you not concerned about knockoffs though? "whats ur moat" is an annoying question but I do think it's important for long term success
@MehtabKarta So along with MOQ and launch costs, are you thinking about it as % of the next X years of revenue from that particular product? This is the side of product dev that is largely a mystery to me. Would love to learn more but not sure where to look
@elanmiller I'm an industrial designer, not a branding person, but this type of conversation is literally the hardest part of the job. I struggle with it, especially the bottom-up approach. Great article, would love to hear/read more about this
@natelagos Those types of insights are absolutely valuable to product people (like myself). It's just important to recognize when it's a genuine insight and when it's just your own personal opinion/preference
@SolomonHanes Anyone involved in the business of manufactured goods (all of DTC and product dev) was impacted severely by the tar!ffs. The good news is, it's not you, it's macro. The bad news is, that means there's not much we can do about it.
@michaelmiraflor Interesting, my theory is kind of the opposite--the product needs to be appealing on its own merits, regardless of the brand. But you've studied this more than me!
@TaylorHoliday@jacob_posel The best solutions I'm aware of are royalty/profit share situations. I'd love to hear other ideas though!
Jacob, to be more specific, I think it's product innovation, not just design. Design-as-beautification is already being automated/disrupted
@TaylorHoliday@jacob_posel As a designer, it's on my mind a lot ๐ I/we create new products that can be the foundation for massive biz growth, but we capture relatively little compensation compared to marketing folks. Not many good solutions, either.
@moizali The spirit of this is solid, but the "gut" part rubs me the wrong way. Feels like this leads to "my gut instinct is better than your gut instinct" type of debates