There’s a tale that circulates around Eureka! Ranch about Doug Hall cutting the tie off of an executive from one of the nation’s largest beer producers.
Hall is the founder and CEO of Eureka! Ranch, an 80-acre "farm" that grows ideas and harvests innovation for some of the America’s top companies. Whether the story is fact or fiction, it represents Hall well — he’s a nonconformist who is unimpressed with the price of a tie or the size of an organization.
Hall’s inventiveness and rebellious nature have driven Eureka! Ranch’s success over the past 18 years. And while you may not recognize his name, you know his work — Hall’s patented scientific system for generating ideas, innovation and marketing has been the genesis for the development of thousands of products and services for clients including PepsiCo., AT&T and Frito-Lay.
With rates starting at $15,000 for one, two and three-day workshops, Hall and his team of innovation gurus boast an almost unheard of 88 percent customer repeat rate. In a nutshell, Hall’s process of inspiring and developing business-building ideas that are more effective and measurably less risky works.
A chemical engineer by education and an alumnus of Procter & Gamble, where he was master marketing inventor, Hall is in the business of fostering creativity. Suits are forbidden at Eureka! Even Hall’s tax attorneys have to shed the formal wear when they visit.
What started as a creative rebellion against the stifling corporate red tape that can suck the life out of even the most enthusiastic executive has become a revolutionary movement, attracting followers across the globe. That demand resulted in Hall opening an Oxford, England, location to serve his European clients.
For a man who is unimpressed with corporate America’s constraints, Hall has created and nurtured a rather large business empire. The difference between him and Corporate America, he says, is that he created a system that’s grown by fostering the creativity of a few rather than expanding by adding employees.
Smart Business spoke with Hall about how to step outside the board room and get the creative juices flowing.
