Innovation Anywhere, Even in a Public Restroom
Do not tell me that you have to be in the high-tech or fashion world to be a world-class innovator. In my upcoming book, I describe how Minneapolis-based Anchor Wall Systems has reinvented retaining walls with innovations in design (over 700 different shapes and colors), customization (easy Lego-like assembly), and technology (new, clean pin-less and mortar-less processes). The upshot? Over 50% market share with premium pricing and very loyal institutional and individual customers. They’re loyal because they’re delighted with what AWS provides them.
A couple weeks ago I was at an Amtrak station in Connecticut waiting to take a train to Providence, Rhode Island. During my wait, I got delighted with a reinvention of another mundane product. Picture this familiar scene. You go to a public toilet. You wash your hands. You use a dinky little hand dryer which emits a dinky little blast of air and takes forever to dry your hands. Usually I wind up sticking my hands underneath for a while, then wiping them on my pants, or else just saying the hell with it and pulling down the paper towels.
But there, in the little Amtrak station outside Greenwich, I found salvation: The XLerator from Massachusetts-based Excel Dryer. It’s big, at least triple the size of a standard hand dryer. The heat it blasts is not only huge and effective (dries your hands fast) but actually feels darn pleasurable. I loved it. And, as I learned when I researched the company, it not only fully dries your hands within 15 seconds (three times faster than ordinary dryers), it also uses 80% less energy than the little dryers and 95% less energy than paper towels. Now that’s innovation! And Excel is doing it with hair dryers as well.
One innovation won’t cut it, either for Anchor Wall Systems or for Excel Dryer. Sustainable competitive advantage is about creating a culture of constant innovation that yields a steady pipeline of fresh, compelling products that excite customers. That’s precisely what these companies seem to be committed to. Good for them. But I like them for another reason: they demonstrate once again—just like Progressive has successfully done with insurance and UPS has successfully done with supply chain management—that innovation can, and should, take place in any industry, however mundane, anywhere.
A couple weeks ago I was at an Amtrak station in Connecticut waiting to take a train to Providence, Rhode Island. During my wait, I got delighted with a reinvention of another mundane product. Picture this familiar scene. You go to a public toilet. You wash your hands. You use a dinky little hand dryer which emits a dinky little blast of air and takes forever to dry your hands. Usually I wind up sticking my hands underneath for a while, then wiping them on my pants, or else just saying the hell with it and pulling down the paper towels.
But there, in the little Amtrak station outside Greenwich, I found salvation: The XLerator from Massachusetts-based Excel Dryer. It’s big, at least triple the size of a standard hand dryer. The heat it blasts is not only huge and effective (dries your hands fast) but actually feels darn pleasurable. I loved it. And, as I learned when I researched the company, it not only fully dries your hands within 15 seconds (three times faster than ordinary dryers), it also uses 80% less energy than the little dryers and 95% less energy than paper towels. Now that’s innovation! And Excel is doing it with hair dryers as well.
One innovation won’t cut it, either for Anchor Wall Systems or for Excel Dryer. Sustainable competitive advantage is about creating a culture of constant innovation that yields a steady pipeline of fresh, compelling products that excite customers. That’s precisely what these companies seem to be committed to. Good for them. But I like them for another reason: they demonstrate once again—just like Progressive has successfully done with insurance and UPS has successfully done with supply chain management—that innovation can, and should, take place in any industry, however mundane, anywhere.
posted by Oren Harari at 11:32 AM
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