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New and Improved Products that make life easier are all the rage. Your next big business idea may be making a good, everyday item great.

By Nichole L. Torres

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

You've seen them all over. You may even use one or two of them during your average day. They're convenience products--those nifty little inventions that make typical tasks just a bit easier. Think cups with spill-proof tops or organizers that keep your car tidy. Not only do you use convenience products all the time, but you've also probably come up with a few ideas of your own--the kind that start with, "Hmm . . . somebody should invent a . . . ."

But it's still a difficult market to crack, says Dave Sutton, CEO and president of Inforte, a Chicago-based strategic consulting firm that does marketing analytics and business intelligence work. "There are a lot of missteps with this [kind of product]," he says. "Mainly because people oversimplify what the need might be . . . and the new device doesn't do anything substantively different than the old type of thing."

Even so, entrepreneurs shouldn't try to completely reinvent the wheel with a product--or try so hard to make it unique that it doesn't fit into any established retail categories (like health and beauty, food, automotive, travel, and so on).