When we buy candles, we generally consider how they look or how they smell. Therefore, most candle makers carve their candles artistically or add scents to the candle waxes (e.g., Red Roses of Jo Malone). However, some candle makers pay attention to a different aspect of candle: wick.

A candle wick is usually a braided cotton that holds the flame of a candle. Wicks can be made of material other than string or cord, such as wood, although they are rare (Wikipedia). Recently, I met a candle maker who was selling wood wick candles. She told me her candles make a relaxing SOUND of burning wood. Since I was fascinated by the sound, I bought her candle without considering how it looked or how it smelled.

Designers and marketers are always searching for latent needs, the needs that consumers do not express verbally. Since a wide variety of shapes and scents are existing in the candle market, candle designers and marketers consider innovating their candles by offering different types of burning sounds.

Reference

Urban, G. L., & Hauser, J. R. (2004). “Listening in” to find and explore new combinations of customer needs. Journal of Marketing, 68(2), 72-87.

By “listening in” to ongoing dialogues between customers and Web-based virtual advisers (e.g., Kelley Blue Book’s Auto Choice Advisor), the authors identify new product opportunities based on new combinations of customer needs. The data are available at little incremental cost and provide the scale necessary for complex products (e.g., 148 trucks and 129 customer needs in the authors’ application). The authors describe and evaluate the methodologies with formal analysis, Monte Carlo simulation (calibrated on real data), and a “proof-of-concept” application in the pickup-truck category (more than 1000 Web-based respondents). The application identified opportunities for new truck platforms worth approximately $2.4 billion–$3.2 billion and $1 billion–$2 billion, respectively.