So when word got out that the main tea competitor, Tetley, had a bizarre new product up its sleeve, we and our client weren’t unduly worried. PG Tips came in square tea bags, like the rest of the market in those days. Tetley’s new tea idea was round bags. This made no sense at all to us. The tea would taste just the same, wouldn’t it? We gave it a few months, at best. But how wrong we were. People loved the new round bags Tetley shot to brand leader in a year. We were reminded of this when we visited a Paul Smith exhibition. Among his mantras was: “Don’t make sense”
Excerpt from: How not to Plan: 66 ways to screw it up by Les Binet and Sarah Carter