Really strong compilation here. The Lasker-Sunkist example of creating the entire concept of 'orange juice' as a daily staple is wild when you think about reframing a surplus problem into a consumer habit. I remember hearing how most households barely touched citrus outside of special occassions before that campain. The way you layered these stories shows how every 'new grain' eventually becomes the next thing that neeeds challenging.
Thank you! The Sunkist case really is fascinating, isn't it? What strikes me most is how structural Lasker's thinking wasâhe didn't just advertise oranges harder, he literally invented a new use case. Before that campaign, the idea of squeezing perfectly good fruit just to drink it seemed almost wasteful to most people.
And you've identified the central tension perfectly: "every 'new grain' eventually becomes the next thing that needs challenging." Lasker built the advertising establishment, then Bernbach had to tear it down 40 years later. It's almost like each innovation contains the seeds of its own obsolescence.
Question for you (and others): Do you think there's a way to build systems that anticipate their own need to be challenged? Or is that resistance to change just an inevitable feature of successâonce something works, we naturally calcify around it?
I keep thinking about Suzanne Simard's "wood wide web" in this context. Forests survived for millennia by building cooperation into the foundation, not competition. Maybe the issue isn't that new ideas become old dogmaâmaybe it's that we design our human systems around the wrong biological metaphor?
Curious what patterns you're seeing in your own field where yesterday's innovation has become today's orthodoxy. đ€
Really strong compilation here. The Lasker-Sunkist example of creating the entire concept of 'orange juice' as a daily staple is wild when you think about reframing a surplus problem into a consumer habit. I remember hearing how most households barely touched citrus outside of special occassions before that campain. The way you layered these stories shows how every 'new grain' eventually becomes the next thing that neeeds challenging.
Thank you! The Sunkist case really is fascinating, isn't it? What strikes me most is how structural Lasker's thinking wasâhe didn't just advertise oranges harder, he literally invented a new use case. Before that campaign, the idea of squeezing perfectly good fruit just to drink it seemed almost wasteful to most people.
And you've identified the central tension perfectly: "every 'new grain' eventually becomes the next thing that needs challenging." Lasker built the advertising establishment, then Bernbach had to tear it down 40 years later. It's almost like each innovation contains the seeds of its own obsolescence.
Question for you (and others): Do you think there's a way to build systems that anticipate their own need to be challenged? Or is that resistance to change just an inevitable feature of successâonce something works, we naturally calcify around it?
I keep thinking about Suzanne Simard's "wood wide web" in this context. Forests survived for millennia by building cooperation into the foundation, not competition. Maybe the issue isn't that new ideas become old dogmaâmaybe it's that we design our human systems around the wrong biological metaphor?
Curious what patterns you're seeing in your own field where yesterday's innovation has become today's orthodoxy. đ€