How to discover product ideas worth over 100 million US dollars [MFM]

Frameworks, Tactics, and Ideas from Eric Ryan Meet Eric Ryan Eric is a wizard at building billion-dollar brands from boring products. His track record: ●Co-founder ofMethodsoap (~$1B brand)●Founder ofOllyvitamins ($0.5B-$1B brand)●Founder ofWellybandages●Started nine businesses total He's reinvented multiple consumer categories,applying simple design changes that createmassive value in everyday products. He's the guywho made dish soap beautiful enough to leave on As Shaan put it: "You are the king of commerce, the Titan of Target, the big man of the You’llfind Eric’s best ideas, philosophies, and direct quotes from this guide. Save it.Come back often. Best paired with Eric’s episode. Enjoy! Inside This Playbook PART 3.Eric’s 10 Rapid-Fire Rules PART 1: Product Ideation Framework 1.Find Your ‘Sea of Sameness’ Look for established categories where everyone’s doing the same thing. It’s mucheasier to make money by creating an iteration of what already exists, because you How Eric did it Eric brought an inner-child approach into the categories he created, riding on macrotrends like “lifestyle in the home” and sustainability in cleaning products. ●Method:The cleaning aisle in 2002 was green, toxic-looking, and felt like "mom'scleaning product." So he taught people to think of these products as part of theemotional connection to their home. What to look for ●Categories that are unnecessarily complicated●Products taking themselves too seriously "My core thesis as an entrepreneur is to look for white spaces where there's a sea ofsameness, and it just smells ripe to go do it differently. I look for a cultural shift or a 2.Steal Like An Artist You can be a thief sometimes. But don't steal from your competitors — steal from as faraway as possible. The further apart the two dots you're connecting, the more powerful How How Eric did it For Method, Eric ‘stole’ from two completely different places: ●Personal care: The colors and fragrances v. toxic-looking home cleaners●Housewares: beautiful vases & other objects of desire sitting on our countertop The original Method bottle was inspired by a camping fuel bottle Eric found in Norway.A hand wash bottle was inspired by the texture of a building in Tokyo. What to look for ●Creative tension: the more disparate two ideas are, the more creative tensionhappens when they come together "If it's too familiar, it lacks complete differentiation. If it's too novel, it's incrediblyforeign and it becomes harder to get somebody to try it. So I look for those ideasthat bring together this creative tension, but there's enough familiarity in it. You can 3.The Jumping Off Word Pick one word that represents your core positioning, and use that as the jumping off How Eric did it ●Method: Eric wanted the brand name to represent “technique,” as in you can usegood technique to clean without using force. His co-founder Adam suggested"Method" while they were brushing their teeth. Done. ●Welly:Started with "Nightingale" as the jumping off word (caring for you), whichevolved to Welly. "Each time I saw the name, it was like no debate, that’s it.” "Naming a brand is the most difficult part of a startup because everything is takenand it's so subjective. The holy grail of naming is one word, four letters, if you can do 4.Find The Intersection of Altruism and Narcissism Find the balance between selfish appeal and doing good. If you can deliver on both, How Eric did it With Method, people bought it for narcissistic reasons (loved the fragrance & thedesign), but the altruism (good for me, good for the planet) kept them coming back. He What to look for ●Narcissism: What makes customers feel good about themselves for buying this?●Altruism: What's the "doing good" element that keeps them coming back? “For our chicken farm [idea], we need to sell the narcissism that this is the mostorganic, good for you, great tasting chicken. But the altruism is that you can feelgood that this chicken, while they had a short life, had a really good life.” 5.Living In The ‘State of Make’ Speed kills in creativity. Eric's team would turn international retail scouting trips intosolid product concepts within 24 hours by using time zones and a tight creative process. How Eric did it Eric would take Target buyers and his design team on trend trips to Tokyo, London, or 1.Morning: Kick off with the big macro trends they're hunting for 2.Day: Everyone gets a scavenger hunt assignment. By 5pm happy hour, eachperson must bring multiple ideas they're excited about3.Dinner: They discuss, pick the best concepts, then Eric calls the creative teamback in San Francisco (where it's morning) What to look for ●Small, agile teams that can move fast●Geographic time zone advantages you can exploit●Ways to maintain creative momentum before it dies "I love that line by Steve Jobs — ‘trust people, just not in groups.’ So it allows you tokeep a really small team that's agile, that isn't overthinking things,