Wednesday, October 17, 2012

How Fragile is Our Interconnected World?

Just as we expect to throw a switch and have the lights come on, or turn a tap and draw a glass of clean and clear drinking water, we expect to pick up the phone and make a call, or open a browser and access the Internet.

In this age of the early 21st Century we expect that the infrastructures on which we depend and take for granted will always be there.

Imagine, if you can, what happens when even one falls over.

Ok, water and power are basics; floods, famines, earthquakes and the like can knock them out in short order, without warning. But telecommunications? That's a bag of a different color.

Today, down under in New Zealand we have a 'deregulated' telecoms environment, where multiple providers hire space on lines maintained any an independent company and tout their services as better, more, cheaper etc.

It's when the mustard hits the fan that counts. How long does it take for them to recover from a severe outage that suddenly, without warning, plunges their customers into the void of no dial tone.

Of course at Nutshell we believe you can take steps to keep your own devices in good health. But sometimes stuff happens beyond our control.

It's moments like those that you realize just how truly fragile the world in which we live really is.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Getting IT right

Just posted a couple of segmented email messages out to our customer database in the past couple of weeks....one about the cases we offer for the new iPhone 5 and the other a general release (to non-apple users) about Nutshell cases that we have matched to a slew of new mobile Smartphones that have hit, or are about to hit, the markets.

Unfortunately, while we got a lot of positive responses back for the new cases for the iPhone 5, we managed to get it quite wrong - and have had to go back to the drawing board. We assumed many folk would be putting their latest handheld into a security/protective cases as soon as they got it...only to be told, in no uncertain terms, that that was NOT always the case. And that there are lots and lots and lots of people out there who are so enamored with their latest Apple device there is NO WAY they are ever going to wrap it in some nondescript protective covering.

That really told us, and had us scrambling to get it RIGHT!

So right now we have three new knives in production specifically for the iPhone 5; one is for a case with a flap and one with the case with a tab - that can hold the "naked" phone snugly without any sort of protection in place.  And a third is for a new "sideways" pouch that is the same as the existing pouch we offer for the "naked" iPhone 4...only it is 10 mm longer - to cater for the increased length of the iPhone 5.

The new holsters will share the new case number of #268...while the new pouch for the iPhone 5 will be known as the #214.

(What are knives? They are the sharp steel forms that cut the leather that covers the Nutshell products.)

We expect to have these knives available 'any day now' - and look forward to getting lots and lots of positive feedback...and lots and lots of orders...as a result.

Well, you certainly cannot say we do not try.

What was that old saying?
" ...you can please some of the people some of the time....but never all of the people all of the time."

Very true...and that means, from a marketing perspective...never taking anything for granted. Not even after 15 years of closely following the developing mobile handheld market and daring to think that maybe you know what it is people will want, before they know it themselves. A very dangerous assumption.  But we know our customers will, as always, forgive us.

Don't forget, Christmas is just around the corner...what are you going to get them this year?

:-)