The Innovation Wayback Machine:Even successes have their failings – and failures their successes

All Vodka Everywhere

The decades of the 1970s and 1980s were reserved for the beer wars. The breweries were all over the national networks night after night showing aspirational lifestyles – or beat up jocks – to the masses. Meanwhile, advertising for old buddy vodka remained in the basements with a light coating of dust. Nevertheless, all during the television ban on liquor advertising, vodka companies were getting to know their biggest influencer; the bartender.

Vodka is an easy spirit to mix; it is flavorless and it allows for every bartender (at home or in behind the bar) to be creative, whatever the skill level, and as it focused on its image in the bottle instead of over the airwaves, it more than made up for its advertising dormancy.

Sure, vodka lost share for awhile – but as a result of the on-premise boom it created, spirits have been outpacing beer for the past decade.

Lesson: Think long-term. Start planning for the next big thing now; and be willing to wait for the payout.

Innovation goes in and out of fashion depending on the priorities of an organization. But if it isn’t careful, the same mistakes are always made, regardless of the history. It’s common knowledge that companies repeat what made them successful long after it starts to damage them. By seeing through the romantic nature of a brand or company’s success, straight through to the back story, you have a much better chance of applying those lessons to what you’re doing in the present. Think learning from your mistakes isn’t innovation? How about asking Steve Jobs?

Darrell Jursa has worked for the Coca-Cola Company, several big ad agencies and currently runs Liquid Indulgence, a company that creates alcohol and non-alcohol beverages for established and start-up companies.