Tabasco is one of the most iconic hot sauce brands. Back in 1868, when Edmund McIlhenny first mixed those Tabasco peppers with salt and vinegar, he had a working hot sauce. People would have bought it as is. But instead, he decided to age the pepper mash in oak barrels for three years.
And, Tabasco still does this today. In a world of instant everything, they’re still aging pepper mash for three years in warehouses full of white oak barrels. But not just any barrels. They use decommissioned bourbon barrels, ones that have already been charred by fire and taken on the essence of bourbon in the fiber of the wood. These barrels were charred on the inside for bourbon production, then carefully cleaned and prepared for their second life.
Why go through all this trouble? Because those three years in these seasoned, fire-tested barrels transform a simple mixture into something complex, balanced, and unforgettable. The harsh edges mellow. The flavors integrate. The heat intensifies. The bourbon-infused oak history adds depth. What emerges isn’t just hot sauce, it’s Tabasco.
And you know, sometimes your ideas need the same treatment.
The Fresh Pepper Problem
Any good designer is going to be an idea factory, because they know there’s not one right way to solve a problem. So, you need a set of solution ideas to judge what’s good. But what happens when you discover that one idea you think is destined for greatness? What do you do next?
We live in a world that rewards speed. Ship fast. Fail fast. Move fast and break things. But what if that advice has a negative impact? What if it’s eroding our best ideas before they have a chance to reach their potential?
It happens all the time. A designer gets excited about a concept and immediately starts socializing it. A design leader hears about an interesting approach and brings it into sprint prioritization. We’re so afraid of being late to the party that we show up with half-baked ideas that taste like, well, fresh pepper mash. They lack the depth that comes from maturing in oak barrels.
These rushed ideas are weaker and one-dimensional. They might create a brief sensation, but they don’t have staying power. They lack the complexity that comes from deep thinking and iteration over time. Worse, when they inevitably fall flat, we lose credibility. People start to tune us out when we get excited about the “next big thing.”
The cost isn’t just the failed idea. It’s all the future ideas that people won’t listen to because we’ve trained them to expect pepper mash instead of an industry-defining Tabasco product.
Creating Spaces for Maturation
The next question is, how do we create the conditions and spaces for ideas to develop their full flavor potential? The answer isn’t just “slow down”. It takes more intentionality than that. It’s about being choosy with which ideas get the oak barrel treatment. Not every idea recipe has what it takes to mature into something special.
Design leaders need to create spaces for ideas to mature. This can work in a few different ways. Some leaders carve out time for passion projects where designers can explore concepts without immediate pressure to ship. Others form small sub-teams around promising but early-stage ideas, giving them room to iterate and evolve. Still others build and use close relationships with one or two key product partners and quietly collaborate on ideas to let them mature. There’s no “right” way to do this, but it takes intentionality.
The key to ideas maturing is in circulation. Just like Tabasco masters periodically check their barrels, you need to revisit your ideas to see if they are still valid, or if the context around the idea shifted to enhance or harm the idea. Maybe it’s bi-weekly “idea check-ins” or regular 1:1s where people share what they’ve been thinking about. Maybe it’s informal sessions where people can bring their passion concepts to a safe space for sharing and sharpening through conversation.
One approach I particularly love is creating networks for ideas to travel, and very low-fidelity artifacts to share. The concept sharing network leans on the need for good storytelling to “fill in” where the rendering is unclear. You can take a promising concept and share it with one person to see what they think. Someone you trust who will tell you if it stinks. Then refine and try it on someone else. Then refine again and repeat. Each conversation adds something new. Each perspective reveals a gap or opportunity that wasn’t visible before.
One important note by Adam Grant in his book Originals is on the kind of relationships needed to help ideas mature. You don’t want only supporters, you also want people who you know will be against it. However, the worst people are the ones who won’t really give it to you straight. They support you when it’s advantageous for themselves, but ready to undermine you when it’s not. So, beware of the relationships you trust with your ideas.
But, all of this takes time. It’s one of the secret ingredients to maturing ideas.
Beyond the Conversations
Here’s where the Tabasco metaphor gets really interesting. Those master blenders don’t just stick barrels in a warehouse and forget about them. They actively monitor the process. They taste. They test. They know when to move barrels to different locations based on temperature and humidity. But they also know when to let things sit.
The same applies to idea development. The conversations are important. But those conversations should lead somewhere. Sometimes you need to actively work on an idea. Think about the idea from multiple angles. Sketch variations. Run it past users. Build prototypes.
Other times, you need to let it sit. You file it away and let your subconscious work on it. You wait for the right environment or the right team or the right market conditions. You let time mature to catch up to your ideas.
The skill is knowing which approach an idea needs at any given moment. Push too hard, and you’ll force something where the conditions aren’t right. Ignore it completely, and promising concepts will die from neglect or miss their window of opportunity.
The Designer’s Future Vision
There’s something interesting about innovative designers: they tend to live in the future. They see possibilities that don’t exist yet. They imagine solutions to problems that markets haven’t quite recognized. This is both a superpower and a curse.
When you’re always thinking two years ahead, it’s tempting to be impatient and try to rush ideas to market. You see the future so clearly that you assume everyone else does too. But they don’t. Sometimes the market needs time to catch up to your vision. Sometimes your vision is so far out that you lose credibility when you suggest it.
This is where patience becomes strategic. Some ideas need extra aging not because they’re underdeveloped, but because the world (the context) isn’t ready for their full flavor yet. The timing isn’t right. The market hasn’t evolved to appreciate what you’re offering. The supporting technology hasn’t matured (just look at all the “AI features”).
Learning to recognize these far-out future ideas is crucial. They need a different kind of incubation. Less about refining the idea itself and more about preparing the ground for when it’s time to plant.
On the flip side, near-future ideas are more ripe and likely to take hold. These ideas are more acceptable to risk-averse leaders and organizations.
Recognizing Maturity
So how do you know when an idea has developed enough to succeed? There are a few signs you can look for:
- First, the idea has depth. When you explain it to someone, there are multiple layers to explore. It’s not just “this would be cool,” but “this solves this specific observable problem in this particular way, and here’s why that matters now.”
- Second, it has resilience. When people poke holes in it, the idea holds up. Ideally, it evolves. The criticism reveals new valuable opportunities rather than fatal flaws.
- Third, it starts connecting to other things. Mature ideas don’t live in isolation. They start to relate to market trends, user needs, technical capabilities, and business objectives. They become part of a larger story. They support the future vision of your company.
- Finally, other people start to see it…and it intrigues them. They don’t just nod politely, but genuinely understand and get excited about the possibility. When an idea is truly ready, it begins to spread naturally.
Roll Out The Barrels
Here’s what three years in oak barrels gives you: complexity, balance, and staying power. The same thing happens with ideas that get proper development time.
Rushed ideas are like hot sauce made yesterday. They might have immediate impact, but they lack nuance. They (might) make a quick buck, but they’re quickly forgotten. Ideas that have been properly aged alter the landscape and become fixtures that people remember. They influence how people think and act long after the initial implementation.
These mature ideas also tend to be more robust. They’ve been tested against real constraints over time. They’ve evolved through multiple perspectives. They’re not just theoretical possibilities, they’re practical solutions that account for the messy realities of implementation.
Most importantly, they build your reputation as someone who brings substance, not just novelty. People start to pay attention when you get excited about something because they know you don’t launch half-baked ideas out there.
The next time you have an idea that feels promising, resist the urge to serve it immediately. Ask yourself: does this need more time in the barrel? What would happen if I let this develop for a few more weeks or months? Who could I run this past for feedback?
Some of your best work might be aging in barrels right now, developing the complexity that will make it unforgettable when the time is right.
Not every idea is worth spending time on to mature, so consider it wisely. Then, do the work to intensify the idea to its maximum flavor potential.