Toast, Sandwiches and Special Orders

Mike Donoghue is a member of a multinational information technology corporation where he collaborates on the communications guidelines and customer relationship strategies affecting the interactions with internal and external clients. He has analyzed, defined, designed and overseen processes for various engagements including product usability and customer satisfaction, best practice enterprise standardization, relationship/branding structures, and distribution effectiveness and direction. He has also established corporate library solutions to provide frameworks for sales, marketing, training, and support divisions.

  Applications Delivery   CRM   Information Technology   Quality   Stakeholder Management   Testing/Test Management  

When one has control over one’s product, it can be a comforting thing. You may have developed the most wonderful application since the creation of sliced bread, but even that particular invention has had a great deal of customization over the years and gone down many paths of redevelopment because of its implications (not to mention the impact it had on other products).

Sliced bread is actually a fairly recent phenomenon, having only been around since 1928. The first invention was built by an Iowa jeweler and watch repairman named Otto Frederick Rohwedder who used his mechanical knowledge to design the first machine that could both slice the bread as well as wrap it. Through a baker friend, Rohwedder sold his first machine and the offering of pre-sliced bread began to take off relatively quickly.

The seemingly simple concept and availability of uniformly sliced bread also produced many outcomes. Bread toasters that had been invented previously but stood all but idle on store shelves now had greater application. More bread became eaten as well, even though slices were thinner, as the convenience made it more accessible. That led to growth in a number of other associated markets: butter, jam and other spreads got considerably more use. This shift also meant an increase in the making of sandwiches and the ingredients used therein.

Having a great product and …

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