Coming up with a great idea is often a case of applying simple logic and opportunity to an existing problem. If the problem is big enough and the solution good enough, then interest will arrive thick and fast.
CNN Money recently documented the case of one such entrepreneur in an article entitled 'Goodbye, grocery store price tags: How a case of midnight munchies sparked a price-tag revolution'.
The article focuses on a company called Altierre, which provides stores with computerized shelf labels that allow store owners to change prices over a wireless network, saving both time and paper.
While the company is already doing well - it received $60 million in venture capital and anticipates $1 million revenues this year, and counts Safeway and Wal-Mart among its clients - appearing on the CNN Money website will have done a great deal for the firm with regards to its online PR and click-through volumes.
The idea solves a very simple problem - relabeling. Currently, store workers all over the US - and, indeed, the world - spend unnecessary amounts of time re-pricing stock.
With electronic price tags, the store manager can simply enter in a new price on the wireless system and the shelf screen will update. Not only does this prevent allocating a huge number of man hours to the fiddling task of adding and removing labels, it also saves paper - a money-saving double hit.
And the idea was born of a simple eureka moment when company owner Sunit Saxena walked in on a group of employees working through a pile of relabeling on a midnight run to the local grocery store.
Speaking to the news provider about the moment he saw the employees hard at work, he said: "I asked how many they had to do. They said: 'Don't ask'. I said: 'This is nuts. Technology can automate this stuff.'"
So good is the product in fact, that Denver retail consultant Jon Schallert, said: "It seems like the perfect product."
Altierre is based in San Jose.
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