will they ever get it right

WILL THEY EVER GET IT RIGHT?

It seems forever that I read about various companies in their opinion improving their product. I take that as an admission the product they have been selling is not right. If it were why do they have to improve it?

The three most prominent companies that I have read in the past but no longer read their gibberish are gore, Polartec and primaloft.

The problem these companies and many others have is that the first guy to make their product didn’t get it right in the first place. Had that person gotten it right to begin with all these years later and millions saved in further research and development would not have been necessary.

If the product works as intended as described by the originator it can’t be improved upon. Then of course there are products that did not work in the first place and based on science and physics they will never work.

However, the upper management hire young people you know fresh blood into the r and d position to work on improving what didn’t work to begin with. Of course, these young people with the new blood did not know the original stuff doesn’t work, nobody told them. They have been charged with coming up with a new and improved version.

What their real job is to create an advertising program for the marketing people that they can use to talk all about the new improved version. The marketing people are not engineers like the new young people with the new blood so they have to take the story from the young people with the new blood and embellish it. Of course, the marketing people did not know the original product didn’t work but improving it was a good thing, so they can make more claims that will not work either but the new information comes from the young people with the new blood.

Of course, from my perspective none of the original products worked or could work so they cannot come up with a new improved version that does work. But these companies and many more will all be doing the same thing but, in some instances, hire new managers to oversee the operation and give it a new direction.

The end result of all of these corporate shenanigans is nothing new has happened or ever will that be positive.

Many years ago, a group of guys that were about 100 strong who I communicated with on a forum that became insistent that I make a 20 degree F sleeping bag. I told them if I could be making it and would not need to be told to do it. They had all these suggestions on weight of fabrics to use that could squeeze an ounce here or there.

I finally gave in and made a bag that was one pound lighter than I did make and still do. I charged them a higher price than I needed to and told them in no uncertain terms if the bag did not work for them, they could not come back to me. the bag did not work.

Almost in unison they attempted to blame me for the bags lack performance which I did tell them is what I expected.

Recently a customer showed up to buy some items and before he left, he mentioned the name of the company who ran the blog. He goes to their ronde every year I guess and he laughs at the guys who are freezing using the garbage they have been buying that was supposed to be a copy of Wiggy’s bags. many of them do have Wiggy’s bags and probably use them when not at the ronde.

To my way of thinking, if you have a product that proved to perform early on when you are making it why should you arbitrarily make changes. The single biggest option to a Wiggy bag has been regarding the original foot end or a boat foot. Otherwise, what someone buys today is no different than what was purchased 34 years ago.

You know the old adage “if it ain’t broken there is nothing to fix” and the other guys will never get it right!