Story of Post It Notes!

Dr. Spencer Silver was a scientist at 3M, United States.

In 1968, he was putting all his efforts to develop a powerful adhesive.

But his efforts are backfired.

Instead of a powerful adhesive, the output of his experiment came in the form of low tack, reusable, squeezing adhesive.

The adhesive had enough power to stick papers together, and it can be reused multiple times.

For the next five years, he tried persuading his co-workers and superiors at 3M through formal and informal seminars.

Silver marketed the adhesive as a spray for sticking notices temporarily on bulletin boards.

But no one took him seriously.

The silver adhesive was a solution to a problem that does not exist.

So, why would anyone back it?

On the other hand, Arthur Fry a colleague of Silver was facing a problem.

Fry, who used to sing in a church choir, was having trouble time in sticking the paper bookmarks in his hymnal.

Whenever he opened his book of hymns, the paper bookmarks drifted out.

Whatever he tried to keep the paper bookmarks together was in vain.

One day he attended Spencer seminar.

It gave Fry a brilliant idea of using the adhesive to stick the paper bookmarks.

It would perfectly hook the bookmarks in his hymnal.

Fry presented the idea of sticky notes to his superiors. At first, they were doubtful, but later they gave their full support.

It took another 5 years to design and develop the machines to manufacture this product.

On April 6, 1980, the efforts of Silver Spencer and Arthur fry were launched nationwide in the US.

The product was named, “Post It Notes”.

Within 2 years Post It Notes became an important stationary item in houses, offices, educational institutes, etc.

For this outstanding product, 3M honored Silver and Fry with highest honors and awards.

Though, Silver created the solution first. It was not backed by anyone because it was not solving any problem.

But people understood when Arthur Fry came up with a problem that matched the solution discovered by Spencer.

Sometimes the solution arrives in our life before the problem; we only need to match the existing solution with the problem that we are facing.