Green Heinz ketchup? Fat-free Pringles? Colgate frozen lasagna? You don’t need to be an expert to know these products weren’t successful.
Which is why these creations, with dozens of others, feature in the new Museum of Failure , a wacky parade of rejected products from years gone by set up in the Swedish town of Helsingborg.
It’s the brainchild of 43-year-old curator and clinical psychologist Samuel West. The idea came to him while on holiday and he quickly purchased the internet domain name. West later realized he’d accidentally misspelled “museum” — a sure sign the project would succeed.
“We know that 80 to 90 percent of innovation projects, they fail and you never read about them, you don’t see them, people don’t talk about them,” West says. “And if there’s anything we can do from these failures, is learn from them.”
Many items in the museum show companies’ attempts to diversify their brand. There’s Coca-Cola’s BlaK coffee beverage and Pepsi’s Crystal clear soda.
Iconic motorcycle manufacturer Harley-Davidson makes an appearance with a men’s eau-du-toilette, launched in the mid-1990s.
“The fans hated it,” West says. “They had Christmas ornaments, Barbie dolls, all kinds of other stuff with the Harley-Davidson logo and it sort of trivializes the brand.
A longer article, including photos of some of the items on display at the museum can be found here: https://www.impactlab.net/2017/06/06/introducing-swedens-museum-of-failure/