His rejection taught me this

As a young entrepreneur I once tried my hand at "product licensing".

It's where you design new products (just one physical prototype will do).

But instead of bringing them to market yourself...

You suggest them to existing product companies.

And if they like the idea...

They pay you a royalty. Usually 1-4% of topline rev.

I was a pretty whimsical guy in my early 20s, so I mainly designed gift items.

You know, a pizza slicer in the shape of a space ship 🛸

Or a watering can shaped like a rain cloud 🌧️

I even got some deals done.

(Full method is in One Simple Idea by Steven Key if you're interested— if you get the book from this link you'll also be supporting this blog)

And there was this one guy who worked at a gifting company (think Kikkerland)...

Poor guy.

I sent this in-house design guy a dozen product mock-ups a month to review.

He'd normally get back to me with something like "No thanks, not a fit for us" or "No thanks, we're already working on something similar" or "Isn't this similar to [existing product link]?"

But one day...

I must have sent him something truly useless because he proceeded to explain:

"Pat, the 'goodness' of your ideas depends on how useful it is and to how many people!"

And I think of this often...

[How useful it is] * [How many people]

Really true of Amazon products.

You can make a lot of money with either:

- very useful to a small number of folks (e.g. high-priced, premium elder care equipment), or

- not very useful but it reaches a ton of people (e.g. ultra high-volume silicone baking mat)

The "home run" products do both. iPhones are both very useful (high priced) and reach a ton of people (mass market). This has resulted in a $3T+ market cap. - As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.