MATERIALS ARE THE MESSAGE
The next decade of consumer products will be decided at the materials layer. Brands that don't have a point of view there are renting their identity.
For most of the last consumer cycle, materials were a procurement problem. In the next cycle, they're a brand problem.
What a product is made of — and what it isn't — has become a position. Customers read materials the way they used to read logos.
A POINT OF VIEW, NOT A SPEC SHEET
Having a materials position doesn't mean publishing a sustainability page. It means deciding, on the record, what you will and won't use — and being willing to lose a margin point to hold the line.
Written by
Founder, Echelon Product Studio
Biotechnologist, product builder, and 40 Under 40 in Product Development. Prateek writes about the structure behind well-made products — and the founders who insist on it.
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Published 14 March 2026
STRUCTURE BEFORE BUILD
Most consumer products fail in the messy middle — not the idea, not the launch. Here's the structural work that makes the rest possible.
THE QUIET DISCIPLINE OF SUPPLY
Founders romanticise factories and underrate the operating system around them. The thing that ships your product is rarely the thing on the tour.
INNOVATION IS NOT NOVELTY
The market rewards products that are meaningfully different, not products that are merely new. The two are constantly confused.