The Best Idea Yet

When Johnny Carson, 1970s late-night king, declared he wanted another day off, it left NBC with a hole in their weekend lineup. 11:30pm Saturday night wasn’t exactly the hot time slot… so the network recruited a quiet Canadian comedy writer named Lorne Michaels to produce a live variety show on the cheap. NBC figured, this thing might not get ratings, but it should be affordable and easy to produce. What could go wrong?

Tur...

In postwar Tokyo, two engineers were tinkering with rice cookers and busted home radios when they stumbled across a new kind of audio technology: magnetic tape. It inspired them to create a range of ahead-of-their-time tape recorders — and the success took Sony from small repair shop to global electronics powerhouse.

Then, in 1979, after decades of bringing cutting-edge tech to homes across the world, they released their mo...

When Jane Birkin's boyfriend ran over her beloved wicker basket, she was stuck lugging a messy tote onto a flight to London. As her Hermès planner exploded across the first-class cabin, her mortified seatmate suggested she needed a bag with pockets. ""Hermès doesn't make one with pockets,"" Jane sighed. He replied: ""But I am Hermès."" Jean-Louis Dumas, head of the luxury empire, watched Jane sketch her dream bag on an air...

In the spring of 1903, the NYC subway wasn’t yet open… the Wright Brothers hadn’t yet taken their epic flight… and the New York Yankees were not yet the Yankees. They were the Highlanders: a group of unremarkable transplants from Baltimore, their future not guaranteed. But through determination—and some old-style political maneuvering— the Highlanders clung on as the Big Apple’s third-best baseball team. Then, with a singl...

It started with a souped-up bicycle inspired by a vaudeville show, and the need for speed. The dream – shared by four Harley brothers and one Davidson – came true, and became one of America’s most iconic companies. But their real innovation? Myth-building.

These machines roared through death-defying races and two world wars to start an entire subculture built around the open road…and became a symbol of freedom, defiance, an...

Who wouldn’t want to visit the happiest place on Earth? Well — at the start of the 1950s, it seemed like no one did, at least not when Walt Disney pitched the idea. Sure, Walt had revolutionized animation with Steamboat Willie. And he'd had critical successes with classics like Snow White and Bambi. But his studio was nearly bibbidi-bobbidi-bankrupt,. Even so, Walt just wouldn't Let It Go. 

Then, after Cinderella (anot...

It’s postwar Japan, and entrepreneur Momofuku Ando has lost everything—his business, his home, and his savings. In fact, the whole country has been ravaged by air raids, and people are hungry. But when he stops at a black-market noodle stall and watches desperate people line up for a simple bowl of ramen, something clicks. What if they didn't have to wait? What if comfort could come from a packet? This moment of inspiratio...

A wounded Irish soldier crawls from a blood-soaked battlefield in the French countryside. He survives, but his fighting days are over. So he settles in the Cognac region, and in 1765, starts a modest brandy business. Richard Hennessy could never dream that 260 years later, his name would ring out—not just in the world of fine spirits, but in the universe of hip-hop. No liquor brand in existence has more musical name-drops ...

Imagine yourself on a sandy SoCal beach, surfboard in hand. But the ocean’s too calm: not a single wave in sight. What do you do? Well, if you’re a kid in the early 60s, you throw some wheels on a plank of wood and go “sidewalk surfing.” This one simple innovation can’t be traced back to a single inventor; it evolved more like a language than a product. Even so, the skateboard caused a revolution in sports, fashion, and cu...

What do you get when you mix a passion for collecting bugs with an obsession for video games? For Satoshi Tajiri, the answer is the world's largest media franchise (over $92 billion revenue — more than Star Wars and Harry Potter combined). Tajiri dreamed up a new kind of video game: one built not just on battling monsters, but trading them. What followed was a full-blown cultural takeover with TV shows, trading cards (glob...

André and Édouard Michelin were desperately seeking a way to save their family rubber business, when a hapless cyclist with a flat came staggering into their workshop. The brothers saw an opportunity…a revolutionary, easy-fix, easy-replace tire. But their real genius was how they promoted this new product: a guidebook to get people exploring in their cars (more road miles = more tire sales). As the guide grew, readers want...

What do you do for fun if you’re a bored college kid? For students across New England in the early 1900s, the answer was simple: toss around empty pie tins (obviously). Soon, shouts of “Frisbee!” echoed across campus quads — and a local recreational sensation was born. But it took a WWII pilot with an eye for aerodynamics and a beachside side hustle to give the Frisbee its wings — and a toy company with a nose for viral hi...

In 2008, Lin-Manuel Miranda badly needed a vacation. He’d just won the Tony for his musical “In The Heights,” he’d been going nonstop. So he took a break, bringing a book with him for poolside lounging: the 800-page biography of America’s first treasury secretary, Alexander Hamilton. But what started as a light beach read soon became an obsession. Lin HAD to bring this man’s incredible life to the stage. Thus began an epic...

Born in a sweltering Texas drugstore in 1885 - this indescribable, 23 (secret) ingredient concoction broke the first rule of marketing: never sell something you can't explain. Behind this mystery brew was Charles Alderton, a flavor-obsessed pharmacist who sold his recipe and walked away, and a big-footed CEO who turned Dr Pepper's greatest weakness into its ultimate strength by making "different" feel rebellious. From dodg...

Enzo Ferrari was 10 years old when he fell in love with racing… and soon, he would make it his life’s mission. After almost dying in an infirmary during WWI, Enzo schmoozed his way into the driving world. He built an unstoppable racing team for Alfa Romeo… until he got fired, and had to strike out on his own. But thanks to his grit, stubbornness, and engineering instincts, he created a legendary brand that would rise to th...

Beanie Babies — the unassuming critters with birthdates and bios — are designed to tug on your heartstrings (and your wallet). But for a moment in the late-90s, they burst out of gift shops and into investment portfolios as America went crazy over Legs the Frog, Pinchers the Lobster, and the rest of the plushie pals.Behind this bean-stuffed market bubble hid a mysterious salesman with a chip on his shoulder named Ty Warner...

Tommy Bahama (spoiler) wasn’t founded by a man named Thomas with a Caribbean address. Rather, this classic lifestyle brand began with two longtime friends and coworkers at a failing apparel company. Facing unemployment at age 50, they channeled their inner Hemingways to invent a fictional hero of the leisure class: Tommy Bahama, purveyor of roomy, flowered silk shirts—and a series of surprisingly good restaurants. Weatheri...

When entrepreneur Henry J. Heinz went bankrupt after his first venture, he nearly lost it all—his farmland, his parents' home, and his own reputation. But then, he launched a stunning comeback that changed everything about the meaning of the name “Heinz.” This Master of Tomatoes built a condiment empire on super fresh produce and, by pioneering food safety standards decades before regulations existed. (Hint: it involved un...

This sexy seltzer started out more than 40 years ago as a Wisconsin brewery’s quiet, nonalcoholic spinoff. Throughout the 80s and early 90s, LaCroix remained the low-key, low-cal fave of Midwestern Little League coaches and soccer moms. But then, LaCroix hit its stride—and its second act, reborn as the trendy choice of Hollywood writers, Instagram influencers, and diet gurus. So, what caused this gobsmacking glow-up? Would...