The Art of Selling Boring Products

0:00 Most people think the big money is only in new inventions or extravagant products. But what if I told you some of the most successful brands are actually from the most boring product categories? Method turned dish soap into a design object and was printing hundreds of millions a year. Stanley went from a forgotten thermos company to a cultural phenomenon. And yet he turned a $400 cooler into an entire personality. They did it by mastering the art of making something ordinary feel completely irreplaceable. But you don't have to be some genius to pull this off or begin to learn how to spot the white space in a category. I know I'm not, but I'm obsessed with consumer products. And I've run merch development and creative strategy for creators and athlete brands like Cory Kispert or Rob the Bank. And I've distilled all that knowledge into three principles the big winners use. The brands that dominate their

0:45 categories long term make people seek out and feel something about an otherwise mundane purchase. Careway, pots and pans, things that are generally put away in cabinets and hidden. But they redesigned it in pastel colors. And now it's something people leave out on the stove or hang up in the kitchen on display. It's aspirational and each product a consumer buys is like laying a brick for their aspirational identity. Or who gives a crap, toilet paper. But they wrapped it in premium packaging, tied it to a social mission, and built a brand people genuinely want to be associated with. This is what separates brands that get bought once versus the brands that build the loyal cult following around them. And for the product teams and brand directors and independent creatives that are building the next generation of consumer products, that layer of meaning is your biggest lever of longevity for standing out, for building something that actually lasts. So here are the three principles behind how I believe the best

1:32 brands are doing it. The first principle is exclusivity. And I want to be clear about what exclusivity actually means because most people get this wrong. Exclusivity isn't scarcity tactics. It's not fake countdown timers or artificial limited drops. Exclusivity is a narrative. It's the story that elevates your product beyond just the functional value and makes ownership of that product itself feel meaningful. The best example of this is a brand called Loop earplugs. Earplugs are a $3 CVS product. Foam cylinders in a plastic bag. Nobody thinks about them. Nobody really talks about them. Nobody can name the biggest brands in the space. But Loop asked a simple question. What if earplugs were jewelry? So they went ahead and designed them to look like premium accessories. sleek, architectural, available in different colorways, and even in different styles for different contexts. Sleep, focus, concerts. They even come

2:18 in a case that looks like it belongs on your nightstand next to your jewelry, not in a first aid kit. And suddenly, earplugs aren't something you randomly use. They're something you seek to own, something you show off, something that says, "I'm the kind of person that thinks about this." That's exclusivity. Focus on making your product feel like it was made for a specific person. And then making that person feel seen when they find it. But here's where most brands stop. They nail the exclusive feel and just think that's enough and it is not because exclusivity gets attention but it doesn't really keep it. And to keep it, your product needs something a little bit deeper. The second principle is identity and this is what converts attention into loyalty. Once your product feels exclusive, once it feels like it was made for someone, the next question is, what does owning this say about who I am? You've heard it before, but premium brands are not just selling a product, but actually selling a reflection of who their customer

3:05 believes themselves to be or is actively trying to become. Like I said, each purchase is laying a brick for their identity. When someone buys Caraway cookware, they're not buying the features of the pan. They're are probably similar quality and even cheaper options. They're buying the identity of a healthconscious, designforward, intentional home cook, someone who cares about what they put in their body and how their kitchen looks doing it. It's an approach the CPG goat Eric Ryan talks about. The altruism and narcissism of a product. If it has narcissistic reasons, looks good in the kitchen or is a little bit of a flex to own because of the price tag, but is also altruistic in that is healthconscious and better for you, that is a perfect combo. When someone buys a gatherry kid soup, they're not buying a kids toy. They're buying the identity of a design conscious parent that refuses to let their kids toys compromise the

3:51 aesthetic of their home. The product becomes a mirror. It reflects something the customer wants to see in themselves or show off to other people. And when your brand doubles down on that identity, when every touch point, every piece of copy, every visual reinforces who this person is, you begin to win really big. But there's still one more piece. The third principle is worldbuilding. And this is what separates brands that are memorable to brands that are iconic. And world building has been thrown around a lot lately, but it is not a clever tagline or some fancy story on your about page. It's about creating a universe around your product that your customer actually wants to live in and invite other people to live in as well. The best example of this is the brand Starface. Starface sells pimple patches, one of the most embarrassing, hide it at all cost categories there is. Early on, my girlfriend would make me look away when

4:37 she had those on at night. But instead of leaning into the shame or promising clear skin like every other acne brand, Starface did the opposite. They asked, "What if acne wasn't something to hide?" So, they made their pimple patches into bright yellow stars. Their Instagram isn't clinical product shots or a dermatologist holding up another brand. It's a whole world. It's colorful. It's playful. It's unapologetically human. It's a universe where skin isn't a problem to be solved. It's just skin. Again, they didn't make some miraculous invention or extravagant new product. They just counterposition by literally changing the shape of the patch and building a world around it. And that world is what made Starface a cultural phenomenon, something people post about, talk about, even wear in public as a fashion accessory. Now, this is the full picture. Exclusivity makes them feel chosen. Identity makes them feel seen.

5:22 and world building makes them feel like they belong to something bigger than just the product. So, how do you actually apply this to your own product line or brand? Three moves. First, find the gap in the story. Look at your category or the category you're considered building in and ask, "What story has not been told here? What customer is being ignored? What identity is nobody's speaking to? That's your entry point. Second, stack the principles we just went over in order." Start with exclusivity. Figure out what makes your product feel made for someone, not everyone. Then, build the identity around that. Get specific about who that person is and what they want to say about themselves. Then you layer in the world building. You create a whole universe that that person actually wants to ahabit and brag that they are a part of. Each principle earns you a right to the next. You can't build a world people want to live in if they don't feel like the product exists for just them. Third,

6:09 think beyond the product itself. The brands that win in all the commoditized categories don't win on specs. They win on the life that surrounds the product and the storytelling aspect. The packaging, the community, the content, the copy. Every touch point is a chance to reinforce that world you're building. Look at dropout companies. They're crushing this in the frozen food right now. They didn't invent anything new. They took on crustables and gave them a better identity. Seed oil free, high protein, actually well-branded. They're winning in one of the most unsexy aisles in the grocery store because they built a product that makes someone feel seen. The formula literally works everywhere. You just have to be willing to look where nobody else is looking and then ask what story has not been told there. So, here's how I want to leave you. Stop fighting to get your clothing brand noticed. The categories nobody's fighting over right now are the ones that you should shift your focus to. The

6:54 dish soap aisle, the frozen food section, the earplug shelf at CVS, products people buy every single day without even thinking about it and probably couldn't even name the brand they bought it from because they don't have an attachment to the story. That's where the real opportunity lives. Not because these categories are easy, but because the big players are asleep at the wheel and nobody's came in with the real point of view yet that nobody's built a world around where nobody's made the customer actually feel something about a mundane purchase. And the brands that do that first tend to win for a long time. So the next time you're actually walking through a store, put your phone down and look around. Notice what's screaming for a better story. Notice who's being ignored. Notice what product you've bought hundreds of times, but you couldn't even name the brand you bought it from. That's your opening. If you have an idea and you need help executing on it, that's exactly what we do over at Orange Tree Studios. So, please shoot me a message and we will

7:40 talk through it. And if you like this video, please subscribe. I'll continue to talk about brand positioning or finding boring products to turn into absolute money printers.