Dear Editor
I've been developing this great new kettle.
It does pretty much the same thing as most of the other kettles out there but I've been able to take all of the good things about all the other ones and made this really cool-looking new device to boil water.
Now, you might say, why bother to spend all that time and energy making a kettle when I could just continue what I normally do, making and selling tea bags. Well the reasoning goes like this: "Buy 1,000 tea bags and get a free kettle!" Of course I'm in the business of selling tea products but does "sprout to catch a mackerel" ring any bells?
Of course making a new kettle is difficult. So I've come up with a great way to do development. I give away a hundred of my prototype kettles around the world to true, tea-drinking, aficionados. That way, I get all their feed-back about how they want their kettles to work and, at the same time, I get them on board for when I'm ready to release my kettle to the world at large. Of course, I make them promise to keep their kettle for a year after the launch before they can sell it. That way, I can ensure that everyone co-operates to achieve the goal of having a successful kettle. Because nobody wants to be left with a kettle that's not worth anything.
I have to admit that the competition is not very happy with me. They are accusing me of using my market position unfairly; in fact, someone called me a snake-oil salesman the other day. I think that's a little harsh, just because I make tea bags, lots of tea bags, and that allows me to take plenty of losses on my kettle business so that I can sell more tea bags. The first few times that the kettle is used in earnest, I can, of course, have kettle engineers there onsite to make sure it all goes smoothly but, once the momentum builds, I'll be fine.
I worked hard to get to where I am and my marketing team kicks ass. Did you see my 16-page ad in Tea last year and that was a year before I launched! Or the article I got in Tea Dimensions last month, "The extraordinary kettle test." So what if I'm using large-scale corporate business practices to our small tea-producing industry; people don't care about service, what they want is their water hot for a low price, they can get all the manuals they require from our website, and there is always voice mail if they have a real problem. Everyone one loves my tea bags — particularly the dealers — so they'll love my kettle too! If they don't I'll just deal direct and undercut everyone. It worked before; it will work again.
Little guys beware: My kettle is here to stay because I have the money to outlast you all. I do wonder some times though where my ideas are going to come from if all the competition disappears.But then I won't need to develop much if they are all gone.
A.N. Allegorical
“Inventor” of the Zyxxam Kettle