Step 1: List the product’s physical components. Active ingredients (detergents) Perfumes Binders Step 2: Remove a component, preferably an essential one. For laundry detergent, an essential component is the detergent, of course. Step 3: Visualize the resulting concept. What we had now was a “detergent” that contained only perfume and binder. It could not clean clothes. This function was lost when we subtracted the active ingredients. Step 4: Identify needs, benefits, and markets. At first, this sounds utterly ridiculous. Who’d want a detergent that couldn’t clean clothes?
