Someone has to do it

Every now and again I get a phone call from a nice person who enquires after my welfare and asks if I'm happy working where I am.
One should always be courteous to headhunters, you never know when you might need one. However these poor buggers often have to fill roles for some really dud companies, I'm talking utterly charmless products or gormless services with a real small user community. Words like niche, select and professional creep in to cover was is essentially the worlds smallest 'me too' market space.
So it got me thinking about products and services that someone has to sell. Products for whom complex SWOT analysis have been conducted - so as to 'crush' the competition...

Toilet Paper - Based on the number of brands out there and the advertising dollars committed this strikes me as a fairly cut throat environment. Makes me wonder what the IR&D budget is... On the other hand we all use the stuff, so the market is universal. So whats your pitch? what is your products differentiator?

Scissors - Its a one trick pony. How do you value add to the scissor experience? Can you brand people as company X hard supporter's? Would you buy a pair of scissors with a laser point for a straighter cut?

(this is harder than I thought... okay here's one that is too esoteric for us mundanes;)

Embalming Fluid - How would like to be the territory rep for embalming fluids? You know they spend millions on improving the product, there's probably a catalogue produced each year. Get three of these guys sitting around the bar swapping 'war stories' about the time the customer wanted the XJ-57n but insisted it was the YG-47m, like Hello! If he wasn't the customer... etc



I try and take a moment each day to thank God for how lucky I am to have my job.