Parable of the Hairspray

In those days in the 1960s, my wife, as well as most of the women in Omaha and across America, was a major consumer of hair spray, specifically Aqua Net. I tried to buy her a can in a supermarket, but was told, “Sorry. We don’t carry Aqua Net. No supermarket does. You have to buy it from a beauty shop. I looked across the endless aisles. All I saw were women.

It struck me that there could be no better place for selling Aqua Net. I found the company’s address of the largest beauty supplier in the area.

I set up a meeting with the owner and… I told him, “You sell one truck load of Aqua Net, case-by-case, every three months. I could sell two truck loads in just the Omaha stores if you give me the okay and pay me a commission.”

He said no, because he would lose his “shop” business. Shops sold Aqua Net for $3.50 per can, and retail chains would sell it for $0.99. I told him if he didn’t sell it in grocery stores, someone else would.

Three months later, you could buy Aqua Net in the grocery story at $0.99 per can. Customers had never seemed to complain about the $3.99 price when they could only get it in the shops, but when it hit grocery shelves across the country, the volume of sales increased nearly one-hundred fold.

Shelf Life, p. 54.