(2024-09-27) Webb Sometimes The Product Innovation Is The Distribution

Matt Webb: Sometimes the product innovation is the distribution. Did you know that Moleskine notebooks have their own ISBN?

the book business relies on wholesalers. They buy the books from the publishers and bookshops buy the books from them. They provide warehousing and distribution for the publishers… but critically for the bookshops they provide a trade account. Credit! The ability to return stock! Ordering systems and consolidated invoices and regular shipping! A big deal.
It all relies on ISBNs.

I used to run a bookshop in a tweeting vending machine called Machine Supply.

One day I discovered Moleskine notebooks in the book catalogue.
They had an ISBN, which meant they would fit into my vending machine automation too. (I built a bunch of custom software.)

I stocked them in the vending machine. (They fitted the shelf mechanism of course.) They sold well!
Would I have stocked Moleskines if they weren’t distributed by the book wholesaler? No, it wouldn’t have been worth the hassle.
It’s such a clever hack.

Moleskines are notebooks. Not real books.
But they’re book shaped.

Every so often I see another product which is shaped like a book but clearly not a book, yet has an ISBN, and I’m like: aha.
Psychobox (Amazon) from 2004 comes to mind: it’s a box of optical illusions and tricks, plus a short pamphlet.

Back in the day I remember hearing about one of the big music publishers – EMI maybe?

This was during the transition from CDs to MP3s.

they’d just dropped a new album.
They were selling it as a USB memory stick on a lanyard in JD Sports, a major high street sport and lifestyle chain.
And that was so smart.

Often when we think about product innovation we start with: how have customer needs changed? Or, how has technology changed?

But instead we can ask: where do our customers congregate? Can we find a novel way to distribute our product so it reaches our customers there? (sales safari)

Or you can even start with distribution, ahead of the final form of the product

I would love for more design studios to be bringing their own products to market.