Five Lethal Product Development and Diversification Traps
| Pages | 48-58 |
| Date | 01 February 1993 |
| Published date | 01 February 1993 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/10610429310039768 |
| Author | E.K. Valentin |
| Subject Matter | Marketing |
JOURNAL
OF
PRODUCT
&
BRAND
MANAGEMENT
Commentary: Five Lethal
Product Development and
Diversification Traps
E.K. Valentin
Countless new products
are
brought
to
market every year.
But
unfortunately,
many
are
doomed from
the
outset. Why?
A host
of
reasons, including
the
following, have been cited
by
researchers
who have investigated new-product
failures extensively (Gruenwald, 1992):
• Poor planning and poor mangement,
e.g.
in
retrospect,
the
product really
did
not fit,
given
the
company's
strategy, technological
and
marketing
expertise, distribution channels,
financial resources, willingness
to
assume risk,
and so
forth.
•
No
salient unique benefits,
e.g. the
product was grounded
in a
seemingly
novel idea,
but
customers found
no
compelling reason
to buy it
because
it
filled
no
need better than competing
brands.
• Poor
quality,
e.g.
shoddy production
or undiscovered design flaws fostered
bad press
and
detrimental
word-of-
mouth advertising.
• Cost
overruns,
e.g. no one
thought
(or
dared say, perhaps)
it
would
be so
difficult
and
time consuming
to
develop, manufacture, promote,
and
sell
the
product.
• Poor marketing
research,
e.g.
somehow, analyses were misleading,
the wrong questions were asked,
or
the wrong assumptions were made.
Lack
of
strategic
fit,
lack
of
salient
benefits,
and the
like, certainly are ample
reasons
for
scrapping any venture.
But
after pondering
the
foregoing
explanations
of
new-product failures,
it
seems evident that they expose more
symptoms than true root causes
and
that,
more often than not, executives should
have recognized defects
in
their thinking
and
in
their products long before new
offerings became commercial failures.
Conspicuous devastating oversights
are
common, however;
and
decisions that
appear foolish
are
made even
by
some
extremely capable executives.
For
example, IBM grossly miscalculated
PCjr's potential;
and
Polaroid's Edwin
Land, one
of
the most brilliant investors
and entrepreneurs since Thomas Edison,
poured
a
fortune into Polavision
(a
costly
home movie system featuring instant film
Journal
of
Product
&
Brand Management, Vol.
2
No.
2,
1993, pp. 48-58,
© MCB University Press, 1061-0421
Financial support, which
is
greatly appreciated,
was provided
by the
Willard
L.
Eccles Fund.
48
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