Method: 9 sparkling insights that turned stinky apartment experiments into $100M eco-friendly empire

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Hey rebel solopreneurs 🦸‍♂️🦸‍♀️

Ever killed a brilliant business idea because "someone's already doing it"?

Wrong move!

This fear keeps amazing solopreneurs paralyzed, watching markets they could dominate slip away while they search for "untapped" opportunities.

But what if the "already taken" cleaning products market - dominated by giants like Clorox and Procter & Gamble for decades - was exactly where two friends built their $100+ million empire?

Adam Lowry and Eric Ryan looked at the most saturated market imaginable and said "perfect, let's do this better."

Let's investigate their secret formula!

🍹 The humble beginnings...

Adam Lowry and Eric Ryan were just high school buddies from suburban Detroit.

After college, they picked completely different paths.

Eric worked as a strategic planner doing branding for big names like Gap and Old Navy - always dreaming of creating his own brand someday.

Adam was the noble one - a Stanford-trained climatologist working at Carnegie Institution for Science on climate change research.

They were roommates in a dirty little San Francisco apartment with five other guys.

Both were constantly brainstorming business ideas during their downtime.

Adam had two massive frustrations eating at him every single day.

First, his scientific research felt pointless - writing articles that only other scientists read.

Second, as someone trying to live green, there were zero good environmentally-friendly products available.

Everything "eco-friendly" was brown, smelly, expensive, and didn't actually work.

Eric was obsessed with finding mature categories that had missed major cultural shifts.

They both looked at the $5.2 billion household cleaning market in 1999 and saw something everyone else missed.

Two massive trends were about to collide in the most unexpected way...

1. 🔍 Stop trying to be everything to everyone

Adam and Eric realized the cleaning industry had completely missed two huge cultural shifts happening right under their noses.

The first was "lifestyling of the home" - people weren't just living in houses anymore, they were designing personal sanctuaries.

The second was the health and wellness movement - folks were eating organic but still spraying pesticides around their kitchens.

Instead of trying to compete on everything, they decided to own this specific intersection.

But recognizing the opportunity was just the beginning of their real challenge...

2. 💪 Your "weakness" might be your biggest strength

Everyone told them they were crazy to take on giants like Clorox with zero industry experience.

But Adam realized something brilliant - consumers wanted products that actually cleaned well AND were safe.

He saw that people would choose toxic cleaners that worked over "safe" products that sucked.

So instead of fighting their inexperience, they used it to create something nobody else could: "Aveda for the home."

Their lack of industry baggage became their superpower.

With their concept clear, they faced their first real test...

3. 🏠 Start where you are with what you have

Most people think you need a fancy lab and perfect conditions to create products.

Adam and Eric started mixing formulas in their bathtub and sink.

They tested variations in beer pitchers (with "Do Not Drink" labels for their roommates).

Their messy apartment became their R&D center, their beat-up truck became their delivery service.

They proved you don't need perfect conditions - you need to start moving.

Once they had products they loved, they had to figure out if anyone else would...

4. 🎯 Test small before you bet big

Instead of spending months on market research, they took their products straight to real people.

They handed out samples at parties and went door-to-door selling.

They befriended managers at independent stores and did live demos.

Consumers immediately connected with the bright colors and unusual cucumber, lavender, and mandarin scents.

This real-world feedback gave them confidence to approach bigger retailers.

But success brought an unexpected crisis...

5. 😰 When you're down to your last dollar, get creative

Success nearly killed them - they had $16 in the bank and $300,000 in credit card debt.

Vendors were months behind on payments and ready to cut them off.

Instead of panicking, Eric and Adam did something genius.

They "appealed to the inner entrepreneur" of each vendor, selling them on the vision of doing something that had never been done before.

They turned their crisis into a partnership opportunity.

Just when things looked darkest, their breakthrough moment arrived...

6. 🎨 Make your product impossible to ignore

After securing $1 million from investors, they did something unexpected with their first real money.

They hired famous industrial designer Karim Rashid to "reinvent" the dish soap bottle.

Karim created unique bottles, including one shaped like a bowling pin.

Suddenly, people wanted to leave their dish soap out on the counter instead of hiding it under the sink.

The design opened doors to conversations with major retailers like Target.

But their first big retailer test almost became a disaster...

7. 🔧 Turn your failures into learning goldmines

Target agreed to test their products but Method failed the initial metrics Target wanted to see.

Luckily, Target noticed Method was driving growth to the entire cleaning category and decided to roll them out nationally anyway.

Then their beautiful bowling pin bottles started leaking on store shelves when customers pulled off the smell-test seals.

Adam, Eric, and friends literally ran from Target to Target with paper towels, cleaning up spills.

They redesigned the bottles, fixed the problem, and kept moving forward.

Their next move would change an entire industry...

8. 🚀 Kill your winners to create something even better

When Method created 3x concentrated laundry detergent, it became 30% of their business.

Other big companies like Unilever copied them, and Walmart started pressuring all manufacturers to compact their detergents.

Instead of protecting their successful product, Adam and Eric did something crazy.

They killed their 3x detergent completely and created 8x concentrated detergent with patented technology.

The old way was thinking like an incumbent - the Method way was to disrupt themselves before anyone else could.

This bold move set them up for their ultimate breakthrough...

9. 🌱 Build your business to create change, not just profit

Adam realized that if you want to create real change, you can't just preach to people who already agree with you.

Method didn't try to steal customers from other natural cleaners - they went where no natural cleaners existed.

They brought eco-friendly products to mainstream shelves by making them beautiful and effective first, environmental second.

Their philosophy: progress over perfection, moving the ball down the field one step at a time.

This approach expanded the entire market instead of just fighting for scraps.

💰 The epic win

Method grew from a bathtub startup to over 100 employees and $100+ million in revenue.

They now sell in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, France, Japan, and Canada.

They forced entire industries to follow their lead on concentrated detergents and eco-friendly design.

Most importantly, they proved small companies can create massive change in established markets.

🥂 Your turn to shine bright!

That's it, my fellow rebels!

Think your brilliant idea is worthless because "someone's already doing it"?

Adam and Eric looked at the most crowded, established market on the planet - cleaning products dominated by billion-dollar giants for decades - and built a $100+ million company anyway.

"If you are trying to start a new business, it is only going to be a success if no one has done it before, which means you need to figure out what works and what doesn't work," says Eric.

"We didn't want to go try to steal share from the other natural cleaners; we wanted to go where there were no natural cleaners at that time," adds Adam.

Stop searching for the "perfect untapped market" and start looking for ways to do existing things better, more beautifully, or for people everyone else is ignoring.

Something tells me you're gonna build something amazing.

Keep rocking 🚀 🍩

Yours 'making success painless and fun' vijay peduru 🦸‍♂️