Small Ideas Make a Difference

George J. Abrams, vice-president in charge ofhe stared he thought, "Why not put a layer of
advertising for Revlon, points out the importance ofinsulation between those two cans?" That was the
all sorts of ideas in the competitive business world.beginning of the Scotch Cooler. In four years his
He mentions the idea of the aerosol container whichrundown business was grossing more than five million
was used first with whipped cream and later shavingdollars annually.
cream. He tells how a small company like Breck inThe profit from a good idea is easy to figure out,
Springfield, Massachusetts, successfully competesbut J. A. Anderson of the AC Spark Plug Division of
with huge international firms in the creative warfareGeneral Motors has pointed out the other side of the
of business because of good ideas. Breck doesn'tcoin. "We have the costs of ideas not thought up,"
have a million-dollar TV program; it does have beautyhe has said. "That is a very definite cost. We have
parlors across the nation using and recommending itsthe costs of ideas thought of too late. We have the
product because of brilliant merchandising ideas.costs of ideas not developed to their fullest potential.
In almost every case of profit-making products thereWe have the costs of ideas not thought of at all."
is a good idea behind the product. Abrams cites aIdeas which people have had-or not had-have made
competitive product which became the largest sellingthe difference in the whole history of man-simple
deodorant on the market. Why? Because it rolls on,ideas and complex ideas, little ideas and big ideas.
using the principle of a ball-point pen-an idea whichWhat unknown genius first discovered the wheel?
created millions upon millions of dollars of business aWho was the person-was it a woman-who
decade ago. His own company, Revlon, has a longdiscovered wheat could be made into bread? Our
record of successful ideas. One is Love Pat. Forwhole world is defined by the men who had the
generations women have been putting loose, messyideas that made possible the automobile, the bridge,
powder into expensive compacts. Revlon pressedthe skyscraper, the airplane, the ocean liner, the
powder, under high pressure, into inexpensive buttelephone, the light which turns night into day. Who
attractive plastic compacts any woman could afford.can estimate the value of the idea of a curved ax
Overnight the Love Pat compact became thehandle which made it possible for one man to clear
largest-selling item in the face-powder field. "I knowmore wilderness and create a new world? What price
of no business weapon so powerful as a strongcan be put on the idea of freedom that made
idea," concludes Abrams.children defy Russian tanks in Hungary in 1956?
There's Herbert Piker, a young Hamilton, Ohio,The essential difference between nations is ideas;
manufacturer, who sat staring at a minnow bucket.the Free World will stand or fall on the strength of
He had inherited a metal box company, which was inour ideas. In a Hell Bomb age ideas are still more
bad shape. He didn't know which way to turn. But aspowerful than any other force known to man.