Lesson #1: The Experts Are Not Always Right

All his life, Gillette believed that coming up with the idea – the product – would be hardest part of starting any business. After all, it took him no less than 40 years to think of a product that he thought could be profitable. He had never figured on the fact that others might not be so willing to embrace the idea as he was. But as Gillette quickly discovered, learning to listen to his own ideas was important if he was going to become successful.

When Gillette first came up with the idea for a safety razor with disposable blades, he was ecstatic. He knew he could not be the only one struggling with nicks and cuts and the dull blades of the traditional straight-edge razors of the time. He knew that if his razor came to market, it would be a smashing hit. After all, half the population was his target market.

Excited by the promise, Gillette immediately rushed over to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to begin working on his product. He needed metallurgists to help him make his dreams a reality. But, when he told them what he wanted, they told him it was impossible.

Gillette wanted to make a small piece of steel that would be hard and thin enough to shave with, yet still be affordable enough to throw away. Door after door was slammed in his face, as technical experts told him there was no way it could be done.

“The razor was looked upon as a joke by all my friends,” said Gillette. “A common greeting was, ‘Well, Gillette, how’s the razor?’ If I had been technically trained, I would have quit.”

Resolute in his belief, Gillette continued to experiment with the idea on his own. While still working his day job as a salesman, Gillette spent his nights working on creating the product. But he knew he could not do it on his own, and as a result, the project stalled.

That all changed in 1900, when Gillette met William Nickerson. Nickerson was an MIT-trained chemist who was used to tackling difficult projects. He had even once built light bulbs from a process Thomas Edison once said was impossible. When Nickerson first heard of Gillette’s project, he too was skeptical. But when Gillette’s few backers begged him to try, Nickerson agreed.

Five years and thousands of dollars later, Gillette and Nickerson had their product. At 45 years old, Gillette had finally perfect his double-edged safety razor blade, with its specially designed holder and adjustable head. He got his patent for it in 1901 and never looked back.

Gillette was no technical expert, especially when it came to manufacturing metals. In fact, the experts were the ones who had told him that what he wanted to do could not be done, that he was dreaming. But it were those dreams that kept Gillette going; it were those dreams that let him do what everybody else said could not be done.

Lesson #1: The Experts Are Not Always Right

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