As a designer and manufacturer I'd love to think we live in a perfect world where decisions on product launches were all about functional performance and nothing about marketplace acceptance. But that's not true. If it were, we might be making active loudspeakers, but they don't sell. We might be building whole house power systems, but they too sit on the shelf. We might be designing cost no object hand-built products, but that's not our schtick. Imagine Ferrari building a Ford Focus, or Whole Foods selling Drano.
We build products from our heart but not all of them make it to market. I was just visiting our room full of designs that never got out the door as projects. We keep them to remind us of the value of staying the course, but some of those detours we've taken were sure cool.
