The Origin of the Expression ‘Best Thing Since Sliced Bread’

Let me tell you the story of the sliced bread innovation to answer your question.

It is a story about perhaps the greatest innovation of all time. At the very least, that is my position.

Here is the story of Otto Rohwedder. In 1912, Otto invented the bread slicer. Sounds like a winner, right? Not so fast though. Bakers rejected the innovation out of hand, saying that bread would go stale much faster when sliced.

For most of us that might have been the end of the story, But not for Otto. For the next 13 years, he searched for ways to hold the slices of bread together, including trying a hatpin. Finally, in 1927, he found a complementary partner, and together they came up with a bread slicer that sliced and wrapped bread. This was the ultimate solution and within 12 months came the first sale of sliced bread.

By 1930, the first commercial machines were put into use by the Wonderbread brand. And amazingly by 1933, 80% of bread was sold pre-sliced. That is an incredible story of innovation, isn’t it?

So what were the lessons that Otto demonstrated in his innovation efforts?

Try many prototypes

Have persistence above all else

Eliminate manual tasks, don’t focus on improving them

Find complementary partners

The end result was a transformed industry and consumer lifestyle. Not too shabby a result was it?

And that is the why and where of this expression, in my humble opinion.