Media Bistro points to a new website from the Design Council in the UK that celebrates the importance of design to business. According to the UK Design Council, businesses that embrace design report faster growth rates, superior stock market performance, and improved performance across a number of key business metrics. In other words, design matters:

“The Design Council in the UK, a group that’s committed to showing the important correlation between business and design, has just launched a big report/site to prove just that, entitled Design Fact Finder. There are all the facts and figures there, with things like “Use design in all stages of developing new products and services: businesses that did were twice as likely to see design contributing to growth by 2 to 1.” It’s a huge batch of data and case studies and pie charts and graphs and things. And they even explain how they reached all of their conclusion, by way of a page entitled “Detailed Research Methodology.” In a field that seemingly has to justify itself to far more people than it should, even if you don’t live in the UK perhaps this is the kind of thing you might want to hold onto in your back pocket the next time you’re trying to talk a hesitant client into trying something new.”

However, Virginia Postrel of the Dynamist blog hints that the UK Design Council might have gone a bit overboard in making its case for design: “I know just how hard it is to measure the economic value of aesthetics (or, in this case, design). To take just one common problem, in a highly competitive market investing in aesthetics may not lead to greater profits but simply allow a firm to stay in business, with the gains going to consumers. I wish there were more good social science attacking these very difficult questions. What the world does not need, however, is the sort of self-justifying junk research design advocates put out and then celebrate as though it proves anything. As a journalist, I’m not ashamed to use anecdotes, but I’m honest about what they are.”

With all due respect to Ms. Postrel, I wouldn’t call the Design Council website “junk research.” As part of one study, for example, the Design Council found that shares in design-led businesses have outperformed the FTSE 100 [a major British stock market benchmark] by more than 200% over the past decade. While the definition of what constitutes a ‘design-led business’ is up for grabs, that seems like a pretty winning argument for making design a critical part of a business strategy.

Tags: design Design Council

[image: Design Council UK]

Thursday’s Wall Street Journal had a great story about consumer-generated innovation at office supply chain Staples. For the past three years, Staples has been sponsoring a contest called InventionQuest that pays winners $25,000 in cash prizes and up to 8% in royalties for innovative new products. In some cases, inventors can pull down tens of thousands of dollars in royalties from new inventions that have been re-branded with the Staples name. In just the past 12 months, Staples has received over 10,000 new ideas for product improvements, including a few that became best-sellers: Staples Rubber Bandits, Staples WordLock, Staples Handy Strap Stapler, and Staples TackDots. All of these retail for under $9.99, but deliver healthy margins.

As William Bulkeley of the Wall Street Journal points out, this strategy of soliciting innovative new consumer ideas has thus far been a winner:

“The contest is part of a broad effort by Staples to develop a stable of exclusive products to differentiate its own brand line from those of competitors. The strategy appears to be working: Staples-brand products, which carry a higher profit margin than other goods, accounted for 18% of Staples’s $16.08 billion in revenue last year, up from 11% four years ago. CEO Ron Sargent says he expects that to rise to 20% this year.”

In fact, the consumer-generated innovation initiative has been so successful over the past three years that Staples has surpassed Office Depot and OfficeMax to become the undisputed leader within the office superstore segment. At the same time, the company has boosted sales by 11% a year and earnings per share by 26% annually. Also, within the past two years, the company has set up in-house product- and packaging-design departments and filed for more than 50 patents. In fact, the store’s private-label “brand” - fueled by wildly creative consumer ideas - is becoming so successful that some grocery stores are now carrying Staples brand office supply products.

Tags: innovation Staples invention

[image: Staples on Donald Trump’s “The Apprentice”]

Walking through Grand Central Terminal in New York on Friday, I stumbled across a series of bold advertisements for German innovation. What made the ads so alluring, I admit, is that they featured German supermodel Claudia Schiffer — including one giant ad that encouraged walkers-by to pose next to a full-color picture of her. Anyway, it’s all part of a new “Land of Ideas” promotion by Germany, which is looking to convince the world that it is a hotbed of innovation and creativity. I’m not quite sure what the ads were doing in the subway tunnels of Grand Central (lots of eyeballs, I presume), but maybe they’ll convince a few hedge fund managers down from Connecticut to invest billions of dollars in Germany.

For more on Claudia Schiffer’s role in the “Land of Ideas” promotion, check out the “Germany - Land of Ideas” website, which actually includes some cool features, such as “365 Landmarks in the Land of Ideas” and the “100 Masterminds of Tomorrow.” Anyway, if Ireland can promote innovation with U2’s Bono, it’s perhaps not surprising that Germany opted to go with Claudia Schiffer as an innovation spokesmodel. While I’m a big fan of Claudia Schiffer (especially her early work on swimsuit innovation), I’m not so sure a blonde supermodel is the right spokesperson for innovation. Plus, I felt a bit manipulated by the ads… One of them features a presumably naked Claudia wrapped in a German flag and the tagline “Come on over to my place.” Another ad features the same image and the tagline, “Invest in Germany, boys.”

What do you think?

Tags: Germany Claudia Schiffer innovation land of ideas

[images: Germany: Land of Ideas]