Good Designs? No, thanks!

It amuses me how certain companies decide to approach design houses for solutions on Design while they donot want these design houses to really suggest them where they should go in terms of directions and product line. One of our clients is a market leader in a specialised industry, has been there for 20 odd years and is of such a stature that the service it provides is synonymous to its own brand name. To be at this position in aprice sensitive and ever in rapid flux market like India is an achievement. Now what is irking them is that new companies are coming into the arena and threatening their existing in some market segments. All products, their and their new competitors's look alike. One of our suggestions to them was that they being the market leaders and enjoying such a neat and unrivalled image (yet), they should exercise their prerogative of directing the market trends visually. They should define the next gen of these products. They nodded affirmation to this but finally when concepts were presented their stand was 'no we dont want to drastically step out of the line'. The product in question was not a low cost one but one for the elite, high society consumers who have a taste for alessi-like appliances. 

In one of the delinberations with their management, they even went to the extent to say 'we dont want a world class design we want something that sells'. To this I said 'who says world class design doesnt sell?' They were silent yet refused to budge from their stance. 

Designers understand the marketing strategies, corporate images created by brands and that they cannot deviate too much from them, but in certain products, as in this case, when the product sells for double the price of other products, is a patentable technology,etc. I guess corporates need to listen to designers. The problem it seems is that the marketing guys are never ready to admit that designers understand more of market than they understand design.