In nineteen sixty-eight, was at 3M Laboratories trying to develop super-strong adhesives. What he produced instead was a weak one, which stuck to surfaces without bonding tightly to them. That is a failure by the only measure the project had. Silver could not immediately see a use for it either. So what happened to it?
Somebody else saw the point. A 3M scientist named recognized that the weak adhesive was not simply a bookmark but a new way to communicate. The precursor product, , launched in nineteen seventy-seven and did not catch on. Once people understood how useful the notes were, they spread, and 3M distributed Post-it Notes nationwide in nineteen eighty.
Post-it Notes came into being by mistake, as the result of a failed attempt at something else. Spencer Silver was trying to develop super-strong adhesives for 3M Laboratories in nineteen sixty-eight when he accidentally created a weak one that stuck to surfaces without bonding tightly to them.
Nothing followed immediately, because Silver did not see a use for what he had made. The invention sat as an interesting property with no application attached, which is where most unexpected laboratory results end.
Art Fry, another 3M scientist, saw it differently. His account is that what they had was not just a bookmark but a whole new way to communicate, which is a reframing of the same material rather than a change to it.
The launch still failed first. Press n Peel came out in nineteen seventy-seven and did not catch on. Once people realized how useful the sticky notes were, Fry says, they spread like a virus. He puts that down to a product: customers put the notes on documents they sent to others, arousing the recipient’s curiosity. 3M distributed Post-it Notes nationwide in nineteen eighty.
wat. The glue was never fixed. Somebody simply stopped asking it to hold.
wat wat
A property only counts as a failure relative to a goal. Change the goal and the same adhesive, unchanged in every respect, becomes the whole product.
How do we know?
Graham Winfrey’s article for Inc, part of a series examining disruptive products through the lens of design, recounts the invention and the launches, drawing on Art Fry’s own account.
What is still unknown
A short business-press article built around design lessons. It relays Fry’s recollections rather than documenting the development inside 3M.
Learn something?
Where to next
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