It can minimize its impact.

Brilliant ! That is a very good sales point of reminder

I think the very thought of good design suggests that it would also be a good product. Good design should be usful, well thought out to manufature (ie economical, good use of resources, low inviromental impact etc) and it should be beutiful. The Eames wooden splint is a great example of this. You can have a well designed bad product but the two should go hand in hand

Good design in this instance is a very weird concept for me. Devices such as the iPhone are incredible design, technological feats, and so much more; although their customization capacity is limited (without jailbreak hacks).

The great design improves the limitations and constrictions of a carrier locked device, but is that really worth it all in the end?

I thought this comment by Steve Jobs puts the case for getting it all right... "[The G4 Cube] was not a failure of design," said Apple CEO Steve Jobs. "It was a failure of concept. We targeted the Cube at a professional audience. We thought they would rather have something small on the desk than expandability and we were wrong. It was a wrong concept "fabulously implemented."
... and it took 4 iterations of the iPod to match emerging behaviours with the technology to enable "it" to emerge!

A product that is designed well to serve the purpose of it's user, then it can't be a bad product. Owing to poor marketing it may not have been sold but the product cannot be labelled 'bad.' A product, created with the only motive of making profits, without meeting the need or even want of the buyer, is definitely a bad product. Even a mighty marketing effort to promote a bad product will be a waste of resources. = Gurudatt Kundapurkar

As a designer it's my job to get people to try something one. It's the manufacturer's job to get them to buy it again.

Good design can sell a bad product in the short term, in terms of packaging and positioning. But good design can never create true brand equity in the face of bad product development.

Bad product is generally bad if the "design" is bad. And a good product is usually good because it is well-designed. The two are inseparable, imo.

Are you perhaps asking if good *aesthetics* can save a bad product? If so, my generic response would be "No". It's only one part of the overall design.

What is that old adage?

A good idea with bad design is doomed immediately but a bad idea with good design is doomed eventually?