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Quite some time ago, I heard two stories about genius ideas. Both of them were allegedly coming from outside the company and sold to big corporations, with those ending saving a lot of money (and also paying generously to the person coming up with the idea).

The first story was about the toothpaste tubes colgate produced - the idea was to increase the circumference of the pipe of the tube, and since people use the same length of toothpaste to cover their toothbrushes, they will end up using more toothpaste.

The second was similar and mentioned saving cost of matchboxes, by only covering one edge with the striking surface, instead of two.

I couldn't find any authoritative sources of information about these, but I think both are famous enough, and I just couldn't use the right keywords. Are these stories true? or an urban legend?

And if they are true, would it be possible today to sell just an idea in a similar way?

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two downvotes, but no explanation what's wrong with the question? (thanks for the two upvotes however) – Yoav Aner May 2 '12 at 16:09
There's a clean-up of questions tagged "ideas" underway and maybe people have been a bit over zealous. I'd view this question as valid, it's not about a specific idea, it wraps up all these "Can I sell this idea?" questions. It should be allowed, unless it's a duplicate, in which case someone should point out that duplicate. – David May 17 '12 at 8:30

2 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

Both seem like urban legends to me, but it is hard to know for sure. I also heard one about cars, where in the UK all cars used to have two reversing lights, but someone suggested that the manufacturers just have one and they could save millions.

If you had such an idea, it would be difficult to sell as you'd have to give the idea away to negotiate, leaving you in a weak position, or somehow convince someone (BigCorp) to extend you a lot of trust.

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Thanks Steve. Exactly my thinking, but this is why I wonder if these or similar cases can actually happen. – Yoav Aner May 2 '12 at 16:15
Of course, it could happen, but it just isn't very likely. – Steve Jones May 2 '12 at 18:02
up vote 1 down vote

If you look closer, those stories have a few things in common: the ideas were easy-to-understand and easy-to-implement and had a huge obvious impact on the company's bottom line. They weren't suggesting to make a dramatic change to the process or to implement a new technology. Such ideas are definitely great commodities to sell.

However, you can't just waltz into a CEO's office and present them - you still have to work your way to the right people and protect yourself legally from someone else claiming it as theirs.

Added:
FWIW, these ideas could've been suggested by an employee who was just rewarded generously.

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presumably you mean "claiming it as theirs"? Yes, good point. They do make great stories and I wonder if they're true or if there's any precedence of even a vaguely similar story where only an idea was sold/bought. – Yoav Aner May 2 '12 at 16:13
It's not impossible to sell the right idea. Most external "ideas" require huge resources to be validated. As I've said, the examples you've given are very simplistic & don't require much testing to be confirmed as true. – dnbrv May 2 '12 at 16:26

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