We often hear about the ‘competitive advantage’, which refers to a company offering a product or service better or cheaper than its competitors. Sometimes, having a competitive disadvantage is an asset rather than a burden.
Think of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, which holds 8.7% of ice cream share in the US. You might know how tasty this ice cream is, but you might not know that Ben had anosmia. This means that he had partial loss of smell and reduced taste. Most of us would think he had a serious competitive disadvantage to start an ice cream shop. Nevertheless, that was Ben & Jerry’s strength as they had to make flavors that were intensely flavored. In Ben’s words:
“I’ve never had a very good sense of smell, and if you don’t have that, you don’t have a good sense of taste. When we began, the game was for Jerry to make a flavor I could taste with my eyes closed. To do that he had to make ice creams that were intensely flavored.”
On an individual level, we probably also have competitive disadvantages. It takes a mindset shift to acknowledge and see all the ways to be leveraged. Imagine if Ben had told Jerry that they should drop the ice cream shop because he had partial loss of smell and taste. Like everything in life, the first step is acknowledging something exists and leveraging that knowledge to achieve what you want.
What is your competitive disadvantage? How do you want to leverage it?
