Tailor This!

Oren Harari suggests that businesses think of themselves as fashion:

The basic premises that any successful competitor in the fashion industry must hold are these:

1. Nothing lasts (including our products, even if they’re current hits; competition is relentless)

2. Nothing is supposed to last (we don’t expect long product life cycles; that’s the reality in business today)

3. It’s good that nothing lasts (because if it did last, we—i.e. everyone in the business—would copy each other blatantly and we’d all look the same and we’d all become complacent and we’d all lose our customers’ interest and our margins would go to hell)

4. We’re making darn sure that nothing lasts (we’re always obsessively putting our time and talent into creating the next wave of new exciting products in order to build our brand, our market share and our income stream)

Couldn't those four premises apply to your business? I would argue that whether you sell cosmetics, clothing, insurance, auto parts, telecom services, or whatever—thinking of your business as a “fashion” business is a very good practice.