Failure Is Glorious

Alberto Alessi transformed his family’s ho-hum housewares business into a

trendsetting design giant. His secret: walking the borderline between genius and
failure.

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BY IAN WYLIE5 MINUTE READ
Has your latest project bombed? Have the past six months been a fast journey down a
blind alley? There’s only one thing for you to do, says Alberto Alessi, manufacturing
maestro and the godfather of Italian product design: Revel in your glorious failures.
Dance on the borderline between success and disaster. Because that’s where your next
big breakthrough will come from.

Alessi, 54, has followed that very advice ever since he took the reins of the
eponymous family business in 1970. His partnerships with some of the world’s best
designers have transformed this 80-year-old company from housewares-trade supplier
to design leader. You might not know them as Alessi offerings, but even a design
philistine can recognize Philippe Starck’s Juicy Salif lemon squeezer, Alessandro
Mendini’s Anna G. corkscrew, and Michael Graves’s Bird Kettle.

But Alessi is just as proud of his flops, grazie. It’s the duds that enjoy center stage in
the company’s private museum, where Alessi summons his designers weekly to
discuss new projects. He has even published a book of prototypes that never made it
to production. In a market that’s crowded with the mundane and generic, Alessi says,
the lemons reassure him that he is not veering toward safety.

Fortunately, most of the products created by Alessi’s impressive stable of 200 free-
agent designers are winners. The Alessi “dream factory” of 500 workers, which
Alberto runs with brothers Michele and Alessio, has over the past decade raised sales
by around 15% a year, to $100 million today.

Now, having conquered our kitchens, Alessi is staking out our cell phones, watches,
eyeglasses, and maybe even our cars (he seeks a production partner for a peanut-
shaped, Starck-designed Alessimobile). How will he do it? By tiptoeing along the
border between the “possible and the not possible.” In an interview with Fast
Company at the Alessi factory, near the Italian Alps’ Strona Valley, he explained how
to fail in style.
Where is this borderline?
The area of the “possible” is the area in which we develop products that the customer
will love and buy. The area of the “not possible” is represented by the new projects
that people are not yet ready to understand or accept.

Working close to the borderline is very risky, because you cannot see it with your
eyes. It is not clearly drawn or marked. You can only feel it by using sensibility and
intuition — two characteristics rare in industrial organizations that are led by
technology rather than design. One step more, and you risk falling into the not-
possible area. So most car producers, for example, work as far away as possible from
the borderline. And step by step, they all end up producing the same car.

At Alessi, we work as close as we can to the borderline and accept the risk of falling
into the other area. Why? Because when we succeed, we give birth to a new product
that surprises people and manages to touch their hearts. And because it is completely
unknown, it doesn’t have any competition — which means we can enjoy big margins.

Is now the time to talk about taking risks?

At Alessi, we have risked more in times of recession. Because there was something to
change in the industry or in our position in the industry, we found ourselves
innovating. When the waves are not too high, we follow the waves. But when the
waves become more dangerous, you may need to find something new.

I have to remind my brothers how vital it is to have one, possibly two fiascoes per
year. Should Alessi go for two or three years without a fiasco, we will be in danger of
losing our leadership in design.

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But what do fiascoes do to the bottom line?

Our industrial organization is very flexible. We have a few best-sellers that sell more
than 100,000 pieces a year, while others sell in much smaller numbers. They have a
long production run, however, because consumer demand just never dies. In any case,
Alessi is not a mass-production company. It’s a research lab for the applied arts. We
are not manufacturers; we are mediators between the expression of creativity and the
real things that touch people’s hearts.

And that means we have to experiment a lot. But doing experiments doesn’t just mean
doing the research and making a prototype. It means putting a finished product into
the marketplace. Thanks to the flexibility of our organization, we can be profitable
even if we sell just 2,000 or 3,000 of each product in a year.

In any case, for us, profitability is of secondary importance. Once we are able to
defend the quality of what we are doing, then we can be profitable.
Contact Alberto Alessi by email (alberto.alessi@alessi.com).

Sidebar: My Favorite Fiascoes

Thousands of American households have a chic Aldo Rossi Conical Kettle in their
kitchens. But they never use it, because its handle becomes much too hot. The kettle is
a fiasco, admits Alberto Alessi, and it is not his first. (That honor goes to a disastrous
collaboration with Salvador Dali in 1971.)

“I like fiascoes, because they are the only moment when there is a flash of light that
can help you see where the border between success and failure is,” says Alessi. “It is a
precious experience in the development of new projects.

“Our most beautiful fiasco was the Philippe Starck Hot Bertaa kettle. I did not realize
that we had gone too far. Inside the kettle was some complicated but very intelligent
engineering that prevented steam from escaping when the water was being poured. On
the prototypes, it worked well, but when we produced thousands and thousands, it
didn’t work so well.

“The kettle was very much criticized. But it was never a stupid project: We just went
too far. There were many positives, not least the courage of the designer. He wasn’t
playing a joke on the customers. He just felt the need to experiment.

“Our customers seem happy to take risks with us, probably because they realize that
we’re always sincere. They like walking the borderline with us. Customers are much
more progressive than marketing people, distributors, or retailers believe. Society is
much more exciting than just a target market. A target market is a cage where people
try to put society. It bears no relation to what people feel and want.”

A version of this article appeared in the October 2001 issue of Fast Company
magazine.

失败是光荣的
阿尔贝托-阿莱西将其家族的平淡无奇的家庭用品业务转变为引领潮流的设计巨
头。他的秘诀是：在天才和失败的边界上行走。

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作者：Ian Wylie5 分钟阅读
你最近的项目失败了吗？过去的六个月是在盲道上的快速旅行吗？阿尔贝托 -阿
莱西（Alberto Alessi）说，你要做的只有一件事，制造大师和意大利产品设计
的教父。陶醉于你光荣的失败。在成功和灾难之间的边界上跳舞。因为那是你
下一个重大突破的地方。

现年 54 岁的阿莱西自 1970 年执掌同名家族企业以来，一直遵循这一建议。他

与一些世界上最好的设计师合作，使这个有 80 年历史的公司从家庭用品贸易供
应商转变为设计领导者。你可能不知道它们是阿莱西的产品，但即使是设计老
手也能认出菲利普-斯塔克的 Juicy Salif 柠檬榨汁器、亚历山德罗-门迪尼的
Anna G.开瓶器和迈克尔-格雷夫的鸟水壶。

但阿莱西对他的失败产品也同样感到自豪，谢谢。在公司的私人博物馆里，这
些失败品才是中心舞台，阿莱西每周都会召集他的设计师讨论新项目。他甚至
还出版了一本从未投入生产的原型设计书。阿莱西说，在一个充斥着平凡和普
通的市场中，柠檬让他感到放心，他并没有转向安全。

幸运的是，由阿莱西的 200 名自由设计师组成的令人印象深刻的稳定团队所创

造的大多数产品都是赢家。阿尔贝托与米歇尔和阿莱西奥兄弟经营的阿莱西
"梦工厂 "有 500 名工人，在过去十年中，其销售额每年增长约 15%，达到今天
的 1 亿美元。

现在，在征服了我们的厨房之后，阿莱西又盯上了我们的手机、手表、眼镜，
甚至可能是我们的汽车（他正在为斯塔克设计的花生型 Alessimobile 寻找生产
伙伴）。他将如何做到这一点？通过在 "可能和不可能 "的边界上蹑手蹑脚地
走。在意大利阿尔卑斯山斯特罗纳谷附近的阿莱西工厂接受《快速公司》的采
访时，他解释了如何有风格地失败。

这个边界线在哪里？
可能 "的区域是我们开发客户会喜欢和购买的产品的区域。而 "不可能 "的区
域是指人们还没有准备好理解或接受的新项目。

在靠近边界线的地方工作是非常危险的，因为你无法用眼睛看到它。它没有被
清楚地画出来或标记出来。你只能通过使用感性和直觉来感受它 --这两个特点
在由技术而不是设计主导的工业组织中很罕见。多走一步，你就有可能落入不
可能的领域。因此，大多数汽车生产商，例如，在工作中尽可能地远离边界线。
然后一步一步地，他们最终都生产同样的汽车。

在阿莱西，我们尽可能地靠近边界线工作，并接受落入其他区域的风险。为什
么？因为当我们成功时，我们会诞生一种新产品，让人们感到惊讶，并设法触
动他们的心。而且由于它是完全未知的，它没有任何竞争 - 这意味着我们可以
享受大的利润。

现在是谈论冒险的时候吗？
在阿莱西，我们在经济衰退时期冒了更多的风险。因为在行业中或我们在行业
中的地位有一些需要改变的地方，我们发现自己在进行创新。当波浪不太高的
时候，我们就跟着波浪走。但当波浪变得更危险时，你可能需要找到新的东西。
我必须提醒我的兄弟们，每年发生一次，可能两次惨败是多么重要。如果阿莱
西连续两三年没有惨败，我们将有可能失去设计方面的领导地位。

但惨败对底线有什么影响？
我们的工业组织是非常灵活的。我们有几个最畅销的产品，每年的销量超过 10
万件，而其他产品的销量要小得多。不过，它们的生产周期很长，因为消费者
的需求永远不会消失。在任何情况下，阿莱西都不是一个大规模生产的公司。
它是一个应用艺术的研究实验室。我们不是制造商；我们是创造力的表达和触
动人们心灵的真实事物之间的调解人。

这意味着我们必须做很多实验。但做实验并不只是意味着做研究和制作原型。
它意味着将一个成品投入市场。由于我们组织的灵活性，即使我们在一年中每
种产品只卖出 2000 或 3000 件，我们也能盈利。

在任何情况下，对我们来说，盈利能力是次要的。一旦我们能够捍卫我们所做
的事情的质量，那么我们就可以赢利。

通过电子邮件（alberto.alessi@alessi.com）联系阿尔贝托-阿莱西。

题外话：我最喜欢的惨败案例
成千上万的美国家庭的厨房里有一个别致的 Aldo Rossi 锥形水壶。但他们从不
使用它，因为它的手柄变得太热了。阿尔贝托-阿莱西（Alberto Alessi）承认，
这个水壶是一场惨败，而这并不是他的第一次。(这个荣誉属于 1971 年与萨尔
瓦多-达利的灾难性合作）。

"我喜欢惨败，因为它们是唯一有闪光点的时刻，可以帮助你看到成功和失败的
边界在哪里，"阿莱西说。"这是开发新项目的宝贵经验。

"我们最漂亮的惨败是 Philippe Starck Hot Bertaa 水壶。我没有意识到我们已经走

得太远了。水壶内部是一些复杂但非常智能的工程，它可以防止在倒水的时候
有蒸汽逸出。在原型上，它工作得很好，但当我们生产出成千上万的产品时，
它就不那么好用了。

"水壶受到了非常多的批评。但这绝不是一个愚蠢的项目。我们只是走得太远了。
有许多积极因素，特别是设计师的勇气。他不是在和客户开玩笑。他只是觉得
有必要进行试验。

"我们的客户似乎很乐意和我们一起冒险，可能是因为他们意识到我们总是真诚
的。他们喜欢和我们一起走在边界上。顾客比营销人员、分销商或零售商认为
的要进步得多。社会要比目标市场精彩得多。目标市场是一个笼子，人们试图
把社会放在那里。它与人们的感受和需求没有关系"。
这篇文章的一个版本出现在 2001 年 10 月的《快速公司》杂志上。

RARE OCCASION: UNUSED!

Hot Bertaa Kettle design by Philippe Starck for Alessi in 1987

In production from 1990 - discontinued in 1997

In unused showcase condition, slightest signs of age.

Dimensions: L. 32 cm – W. 17 cm – H. 25.5 cm (12.5 x 6.7 x 10 inches).

Weight: 1.3 kg (2.9 lbs)

Made of cast aluminium, silicone resin and polyamide

failure

**Designed by Philippe Starck in 1989, the Hot Bertaa kettle was certainly a
spectacular-looking object. A postmodern sculpture for the kitchen counter
top, its offset bullet-shaped body was struck through by a tapering tube that
acted as a combined spout, steam outlet and handle. Alberto Alessi, whose
company manufactured the kettle, described it as “our most beautiful fiasco”.
Unfortunately for owners of this beauty eager for an early-morning coffee, the
Hot Bertaa failed in a number of fundamental kettle-related areas. Not only
was there no way of gauging the water level but, with its handle arranged in
such a way as to bring fingers dangerously close to the aluminium body, the
unwary and unprepared stood a good chance of coming away with scalded
hands, or worse.
For instance, the plastic resin tube that so elegantly pierced the body of the
kettle was like as not to spill boiling water in the pouring, and had a tendency
to release a jet of hot steam towards the user.
Alessi withdrew the Hot Bertaa from production in 1997 after seven years of
mixed reviews. Today it appears on the UK’s A-level design and technology
syllabus as a stark example to students sitting the exam of the age-old adage
that form must follow function.
A few brave souls out there are still enamoured with the Hot Bertaa, but the
final word must rest with Alessi. Speaking to the design blog FastCoDesign,
he said: “Every year, we get some Japanese customers who want us to
produce it. We don’t.”**

Someone who has experienced failure understands that success is never

guaranteed and recognizes that failure can happen due to factors outside
their control. Knowing failure is always a possibility—you learn to not let
the fear of failure hold you back.
For most people, failure can damage their motivation and makes them
feel like giving up. However, for people with the right mindset, failure
can be a great source of motivation.
When you experience a significant failure, it may feel like the end of your
world. You feel like you have missed out on some of your dreams,
whereas going through major failure can be the making of you.
If you are prepared to learn, and learn from the failures of some of the
world’s most successful people, you will realise that failure is not final.
When Steve Jobs was kicked out of the company he started in his parent’s
garage, it felt like the world had come to an end for him…He ended up being
CEO of Apple! Walt Disney experienced his first failure after being fired from a
newspaper for “not being creative enough.” He then started a company that
failed as well…The rest is history!

Success can have its own issues! Often and after achieving a series of
successes, most people allow the success to get to their heads. It makes you
feel invincible, like everything you do was meant to be a success. While a
positive mindset is so important, making good and balanced decisions is vital.
Stay humble, learn from failure, and never stop developing.