{"id":2429,"date":"2016-10-26T15:05:37","date_gmt":"2016-10-26T20:05:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/?p=2429"},"modified":"2016-10-26T15:05:37","modified_gmt":"2016-10-26T20:05:37","slug":"five-simple-ideas-that-changed-our-lives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/2016\/10\/five-simple-ideas-that-changed-our-lives\/","title":{"rendered":"Five Simple Ideas that Changed Our Lives"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Some ideas seem so obvious we wonder how we ever lived without them.\u00a0 I am not talking about technological breakthroughs, like the TV\/garage door\/coffee maker\/fan clicker, but elegant and clever ideas based on nothing more than common sense and an observant mind, the kind of ideas that make you slap your forehead and say, \u201cWhy didn\u2019t I think of that!\u201d<\/p>\n

Here is my list of the top five.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 Bags on Wheels<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"simple-invention-wheelies\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The airport consists of a seething mass of people all dragging a wheeled bag behind them. \u00a0 This convenience did not exist in the early days of air travel.\u00a0 All bags were checked and I don\u2019t think there was any such thing as overhead storage.\u00a0 The weight and clunkiness of the bags were irrelevant; it was only a short distance between curb and counter and \u201credcap\u201d porters were always available to help.<\/p>\n

Wheeled bags are now a necessity based on the extra fee and time to check a bag, combined with the long trek to the remote gate Gate B62.\u00a0 The remaining challenge is hefting these satiated bags into the overhead bin without dumping them onto the head of the vulnerable passenger in the aisle seat.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Upside Down Catsup Bottle<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"simple-ideas-upside-down-catsup\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Back in the old narrow-neck catsup bottle days, the advertising campaign for Heinz catsup was Carly Simon singing \u201cAnticipation,\u201d with a close up of a pendulous catsup drip dangling from the lip of the bottle. \u00a0But the reality was that consumers were merely impatient and madly spanked the bottle until the catsup splurted out.\u00a0 French fries were drowned, shirts bloodied and stained.<\/p>\n

Finally, a fresh-faced marketer challenged the entrenched wisdom of the \u201canticipation\u201d enthusiasts.\u00a0 \u201cHey nobody likes cleaning up catsup mess.\u00a0 Let\u2019s face it, catsup is a commodity. We need to market to convenience.\u201d<\/p>\n

A squeezable wide-neck bottle was introduced, so wide in fact that it could be stood on its end, spank-proof, with the catsup ready and waiting.\u00a0 To make sure that consumers took full advantage of this reorientation, the label on the catsup was twirled around to make sure the bottle was positioned correctly on the shelf.\u00a0 On a recent recon mission to the condiments aisle, I noticed that only Heinz chili sauce remains in a narrow-necked bottle, but this sauce is much thinner than catsup.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 Selling the Tops and Bottoms of Women\u2019s Bathing Suits Separately<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"simple-ideas-mix-and-match-bathing-suits\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Okay, I realize the phrase \u201cthe drapes don\u2019t match the curtains\u201d is a crude (but creative) reference to whether or not a woman dyes her hair, but it could also apply to a size discrepancy between rack and booty.\u00a0 Buying a bathing suit is humiliating enough, but even more so if one half of the combo doesn\u2019t fit.\u00a0 Selling the two parts separately is an elegant solution.\u00a0 I also suspect that it allows marketers to up their prices so that the two parts are greater than the single whole.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 The Common Line<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"simple-inventions-cordoned-lines\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I again harken back to the early airport days where there was no such thing as a common line snaking through cordoned off alleys.\u00a0 Instead the passenger had to pick one of many individual lines.\u00a0 The selection became a practiced skill, calling on all sorts of subtle stereotypes.\u00a0 I would routinely avoid any line with age extremes, i.e. parents with small children or the elderly, or anyone holding a passport who might not speak English, and anyone who looked slovenly, this being the era when people put on their Sunday best for air travel.\u00a0 (My mother used to wear her pearls.)<\/p>\n

The common line is now ubiquitous, and even if not explicitly cordoned off, customers will generally form one of their own.\u00a0 While I endorse this equitable arrangement, I do regret having to shelve my extraordinary line-picking skills.<\/p>\n

5.\u00a0 Pants That Turn Into Shorts<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"simple-inventions-zip-off-pants\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This innovation might not qualify for this list because it involves the zipper, in my opinion a great technological achievement.\u00a0 I have always wondered what goes on inside the zipper as the interdigitating teeth enter the movable slider and emerge firmly enmeshed.\u00a0 All I know is that a misaligned zipper dooms a garment.\u00a0 You might get the zipper on track one more time, but then you have to live with the certainty that it will splay open again, potentially at an unfortunate moment.<\/p>\n

However, I am willing to grandfather the zipper and consider this brilliantly simple application.\u00a0 Pants that turn into shorts, and shorts that turn into pants \u2013 as long you don\u2019t misplace one of the idle pant legs.\u00a0 Now I am waiting for the innovation to extrapolate to women\u2019s skirts \u2013 the zippered tiered skirt that provides a business casual modest midi length that can seamlessly transition to the nighttime micro-mini by unzipping a tier or two, or transition to the floor length skirt suitable for evening wear.\u00a0 The different tiers could be purchased separately creating multiple permutations of the look.\u00a0 I am willing to give away this elegantly simple idea for free.<\/p>\n

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  Some ideas seem so obvious we wonder how we ever lived without them.\u00a0 I am not talking about technological breakthroughs, like the TV\/garage door\/coffee maker\/fan clicker, but elegant and clever ideas based on nothing more than common sense and … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lists"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iVc8-Db","post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2429"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2437,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2429\/revisions\/2437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}