THE BEST ADVICE
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT Don’t Make It Cheaper; Make It Better I broke into an industry that was completely money-focused. Nobody was paying attention to women and thinking about how these undergarments felt, or how they fit. All the competition was just trying to make these commodities cheaper and cheaper, thinking that was the way to go. All of a sudden, I show up and charge more for one pair than anybody can comprehend, and women lined up in droves to buy them. I think I left the industry in shock, but I really believed that we needed to make it better, not cheaper. Sara Blakely Founder: Spanx
Start with a Target Market and Price, Then Build Backward A lot of people get into the manufacturing business and think they can start by designing a product and figuring out the target and price later. They calculate the costs, double it wholesale, double it retail, and assume the consumer is going to pay for it—whatever it is. That’s not going to work. Part of the challenge is bringing the product in at a realistic price that your customers can afford. You have to start with your buyer and price, and build backward from there. Michael & Ellen Diamant Founders: Skip Hop
Decode Problems Yourself Every time I’ve gotten lazy and relied on somebody else to decode problems for me, I’ve run into problems. You have to apply yourself and find the mechanisms that drive your business with your own hands. Later on, you can teach managers the formulas you discover; but if it’s your company, you need to be the one to blaze the trails. Marc Eckō Founder: Marc Eckō Enterprises If You’re Not Embarrassed by Your First Release, You Waited Too Long One common piece of advice entrepreneurs get, and one of the worst, is your product has to be perfect before you launch. In technology, this is a holdover from when customers bought a piece of