Back around 1998, I was at a VC/entrepreneur event and in the course of a conversation I commented that I’d been working with startups for 20 years. A young idiot (as opposed to an old idiot) scornfully informed me that I couldn’t have been since startups were a result of the Internet and the web.

I guess idiocy still flourishes since I was recently informed by a thirty-something idiot that startups and innovation are a function of the web.

But innovation is actually the provenance of minds that think outside of conventional parameters, with or without tech.

They are minds that see beyond what’s being done now to what could be done, sometimes with a new product, but just as often with a new process.

Brothers John and Brendan Ready are two such minds. Their lobster fishing profession may be hundreds of years old, but that hasn’t stopped them from innovating not the catching, but the sales process.

They created Catch a Piece of Maine where you can buy an annual partnership for $2,995 per season to all kinds of variations from live lobsters to just the meat.

The Ready brothers have been lobstering since they were 16, started their seafood business around 2004 ago (at ages 22 and 25) and thought up this great value-add in 2007.

To my mind it’s the best of an all-around win, the Ready’s grow their business, the lobstermen earn more in a very hard profession, and the buyers have something totally unique to share among friends, clients and business associates.

That’s innovation!

Image credit: CatchaPieceofMaine on YouTube

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 at 1:30 am and is filed under Business info, Innovation, Leadership, Marketing, Motivation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Tags: business practices, creativity, good culture, Innovation, productivity
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