A $20 Million Idea

We have a neighbor who owns more than her fair share of Crocs - to the point that on the Fourth of July she was wearing one blue one and one red one. My wife pondered, as we sat on the porch sipping wine, whether she had any Jibbitz, which apparently are little plastic charms that can go on your Crocs. All the kids have them, she said.

What a brilliant idea, I said. How come we're not thinking of an idea like that? As Don Boudreaux points out:

Note that this invention isn't high-tech -- it's about as simple as simple can be. Yet it is indeed something that enough consumers choose to buy at prices that make the product profitable to produce.

And then I heard that he sold the company for $20 million. Now I really wish I had thought of it - and I've spent lots of time since then trying to come up with my own little big idea.

We all have $20 million ideas in us. Step one is to identify them, and step two - and this is the hard part - we have to make big risks to capitalize on them. Start with step one...