Colbert on Toothpaste Brand Differentiation (or lack thereof)

The Wall Street Journal had an article this week about toothpaste manufacturers finally putting a limit on the number of new product varieties that they are going to launch. The toothpaste aisle reminds me of Youngme Moon's argument in her book, Different: Escaping the Competitive Herd. In that book, she argues that we see many instances of "heterogeneous homogeneity" in consumer products these days. Yes, there are many different SKUs on the shelf, but in the end, the items are not truly differentiated at all. In this funny clip, Stephen Colbert makes fun of the heterogeneous homogeneity in the toothpaste aisle!