Sure, companies will still sell things by making them seem sexy, but product information in all its unpoetic forms is about to become a source of real competitive advantage. In the future, in fact, products and the information about them will be harder to distinguish - like the laundering instructions that "speak" to your appliances. A product and its manual will increasingly be one, and closely printed product manuals, padded with dire warnings and unintelligible diagrams, may largely retreat to the dusty province of ephemera, where collectors already cherish the tattered remnants of early instructions for sewing machines, typewriters and Brownie cameras.
Manuals got off on the wrong foot. The Torah, an early guide for living, required too much scrolling. The Talmud added a whole new layer of complication (aggravated by the notoriously poor product support offered by God).
And that was about it for a long time. When the industrial revolution brought the fruits of science to the marketplace, it was often assumed that buyers already had a lot of expertise in using whatever device was being sold and didn't need a great deal of documentation. (Even today, most people who consider themselves experts skip the instructions.) It wasn't until technological products started to gain greater currency that more elaborate product information began to come into vogue. The 1908 Sears catalog, for instance, lists an engineer's level for $75 (a large sum in those days) that included instructions, and a darkroom kit came with a little how-to book on photography. In-store information improved as well, first with the introduction of fixed prices in the 1850s - useful information indeed - and then with the introduction of increasingly detailed labeling, stemming from breakthroughs in food-packaging technology and international distribution.
All of this communicating had its roots in the elemental desire of retailers to get customers to buy. To this day, a grim but mysterious affliction known as "decision postponement" haunts the dreams of every merchant. Such shopper "friction" is the main irritant in what is now an otherwise golden age for the average person who buys stuff. Today's cars, for instance, are superior in almost every way to cars on the market a generation ago. Cell phones, DVD players and other consumer electronics, meanwhile, make it possible for the average person to accomplish things even tycoons and kings couldn't dream of a couple of generations ago. It's a little overwhelming. And overwhelmed people don't buy.
Better product information is supposed to solve that problem. Yet until recently, the quality and quantity of product information just hasn't kept pace. Consumer Reports has long filled an essential role in the marketplace by providing objective information unavailable elsewhere. But for the energetic (or the obsessive), the Internet has brought about the biggest change of all, making it possible to find out about almost anything before you buy. Thus, when we built our house, I was able to learn about the properties of particle board versus plywood, and the tendency of two-sided fireplaces to smoke - all by letting my fingers do the surfing. And when it came time to frame the kitchen, I easily checked the dimensions of the new refrigerator we wanted to make sure it would fit.
The Internet is proof that technology can make product information into a huge competitive advantage. Look at Amazon.com; if it succeeds at all (and it deserves some credit simply for failing to fail), its innovative and useful product information has been a major factor. On Amazon you can find out all about a book, including what other readers thought of it, before you buy. It's easy to do, it's in plain English, and it's free.
New-car shoppers increasingly turn to the Net for information about automobiles, and sites such as Edmunds.com and even Yahoo do a superb job of helping users sort through the haze of advertising, accessories and so forth. Better information results in smarter purchasing decisions, which in turn yield better products as competing firms struggle to stay in the game. Talk about a virtuous cycle!
The strip mall is the next frontier. Nowadays shopping tends to occur at low-priced chains where the poorly paid staff is scarce and not especially knowledgeable, and low retail margins make this unlikely to change soon. Inevitably, retailers will turn to technology, if only in pursuit of their traditional holy grail: the highest possible sales per square foot. Consultant Paco Underhill, author of Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping, notes that teleconferencing and other technological solutions may help retailers achieve the long-term goal of cutting their huge real estate expenses by shrinking their stores. At the same time, this could offer an aging society a return to the neighborhood shop without necessarily sacrificing volume or selection.
