Protect Your Product

Gideon made a sacred ephod from the gold. . . . Soon all the Israelites prostituted themselves by worshiping it, and it became a trap. Judges 8:27

The recording industry produces and sells music. For many years, their product was delivered on records, tapes, and CDs, but these pieces of plastic were not the product. They were the tools that carried the product, which was the music.

These tools became a trap, and the recording industry lost billions of dollars when consumers no longer needed them to enjoy the music.

Gideon fashioned an ephod as a tool to help people worship, but they started to worship the tool, and it became a trap.

Railroads focused on trains rather than on moving people from place to place, and they lost ground to the airline industry in the 1920s. Kodak suffered a nearly disastrous hit when its leadership was fixated on film over digital technology in the 1990s.

Take a moment to think about your product and the tools you use to deliver it. Don’t confuse them. Protect the product, not the tool.