5 Inventors Share The Secret They Wish They'd Known When Developing Their Products. Now Their Brands Sell Millions. Founders and designers of cookware, boxed wine, soda brands and more share what they know now, and wish they'd known before taking their product to market.
By Frances Dodds Edited by Mark Klekas
Key Takeaways
- We spoke to five inventors, and these are the things they said they wish they had known sooner when they were developing their products and ideas.
We all have that random item or product we wish existed. Or maybe there's something like it that already exists, but you wish there was a version that was cuter, healthier, cheaper, or better-made. And we've all thought… what if I were the one to make it?
You should definitely do it. But before you do, here are a few things to consider. We spoke with founders and designers who've had great success bringing products to market, and asked about discoveries that totally changed the direction of their invention or brand aesthetic. Here, five share the advice and stories they'd tell to their less-experienced selves.
1. Think outside the box (literally).
How it happened for Allison Luvera, cofounder of Juliet, an eco-friendly boxed wine brand.
"Two years ago, my cofounder and I set out to reimagine boxed wine for a modern, luxury consumer. We knew the packaging needed to be beautiful, with an aesthetic that fit into the lifestyles of the tasteful women we wanted to buy our products. So we started by hiring an agency to create a chic, modern design for a standard rectangular box. But endless iterations failed to meet our standards.
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After weeks of frustration, we realized that if we wanted Juliet to transcend the boxed wine category, we needed to rethink the format from the ground up. We spent 12 months working with a product engineer to develop our award-winning, patent-pending Eco-Magnum. This 100% paperboard cylindrical shape bridges the gap between boxed and bottled wine, and features custom illustrations created in collaboration with two female artists in LA.
Our Eco-Magnum is a testament to the power of thinking differently. If we had simply tried to repackage a traditional boxed wine, we would never have achieved the same level of luxury and sophistication. This experience has taught us that if we want to achieve something that's never been achieved before, we need to think about things in a completely different way."
2. Question every assumption.
The aha-moment for MJ Truong, head of brand at Meyer Cookware, which makes Farberware, KitchenAid, Hestan, Anolon, and Circulon
"We design pots and pans, and we do tons of user research as part of our product development process. Early on, I learned a very keen lesson on how preconceived notions can prevent you from uncovering the truth and the insights that follow. In designing our questionnaires, we wanted to know about people's saucepan usage habits, so we asked them: 'Tell me about the pan you use to make sauce.'
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To our surprise, we got lots of feedback about another pan entirely: frypans. Turns out, loads of people use frypans to make sauce, because you saute aromatics like garlic and onions before adding tomatoes and reducing — which is much easier done in a frypan than a saucepan. This change in perspective impacted many product decisions down the line. Question every assumption."
3. Decide what qualities define your products, before you start designing.
A hot tip from Dani Gassner, cofounder of OTOTO, a design company that makes quirky kitchen items.
"We approach each product from two angles: functionality and creativity. It's not a product for us without both. Once, I was developing a new kitchen tool, a wine accessory, and I got so wrapped up in the technicalities — the interaction with the wine bottle, longevity, even running crush tests — that I completely overlooked the design aspect. We devoted a significant amount of time to this project, but the end result didn't embody our spirit at all.
From that experience, we implemented a new rule: we don't start product development until there's a clear, imaginative concept that fits seamlessly into the OTOTO family. If the idea doesn't spark joy for everyone on the team, we simply don't pursue it."
4. Don't get bogged down in perfectionism.
A learning moment for Lauren Berlingeri, cofounder of HigherDOSE, a brand that makes wellness products using infrared, PEMF, and red light therapies.
"I vividly remember a moment when I realized I had been approaching product development all wrong. During the early stages of developing a sauna blanket, I had set impossibly high standards for the first version. I believed the product had to be flawless before it could launch. I spent countless hours obsessing over minute details, delaying the launch and losing precious time.
But then an advisor of ours shared his experience. He emphasized the importance of launching a minimum viable product to gather real-world feedback, and iterate on it. That's when it hit me: Perfection shouldn't be the goal — the goal should be progress and continuous improvement.
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So we launched the first version, even though it had room for improvement. And the response from early customers surprised me. They appreciated the product's core benefits and were understanding about its imperfections. Their feedback provided valuable insights on what aspects needed refinement. We gathered user experiences, identified pain points, and prioritized the necessary enhancements. This experience taught me that perfection shouldn't hinder progress."
5. Don't forget that most customers just want to have fun.
A story from the archives of David Lester, cofounder of OLIPOP, a healthier sodapop brand:
"When we were first developing OLIPOP we thought it was important to tell people about the amazing ingredients this product contains. My cofounder Ben and I spent all the money we had on a design agency to come up with a packaging design based on this approach. The design bombed in research.
The ingredients didn't look that interesting or appetizing, and consumers were confused about what they were even looking at. We realized the packaging just needed to be fun and colorful and hit a soda semiotic to draw people in. We found an amazing design duo in Florida called Break Maiden, and with two months to launch, we redesigned the whole brand. The new design has been a huge success."
