Break a thing into its attributes, change one at a time, and judge what you get. It is the attribute listing technique from the Scavengers chapter of the book.

How to use it

Pick a thing. Restaurant is the book’s own chart. The others are ready-made too, or choose Make your own and build a chart for anything.
Start from the ordinary version. The chart opens on the plain version of the thing, with one option picked in each column.
Change one attribute. Press Change this on a column, or click any option. The column you changed is marked, so you can see which one made the difference.
Judge the result. Does this combination make something worth trying, or a recipe for disaster? Write down why, then change another attribute.
When you want a bigger jump, press Shuffle all. Lock any attribute you want to keep and shuffle the rest.

The tool never tells you what a combination is worth. That part is yours, and it is where the idea comes from.

What attribute listing is

The Scavengers chapter describes it as breaking an existing product or service down into its components, then building it up again. A pen has a look, a feel, a material, a type of ink and a way the ink is released. A restaurant has a type of food, a price, a style and a way of delivering the food. Each of those headings has many possible options, and you can make a list of them under each heading.

Then you try combinations. The chapter’s own picks from the restaurant chart are expensive Italian food delivered to businesses, and mid-priced French food in a leisurely, family-friendly restaurant. Some combinations will make a great new experience and some will be a recipe for disaster. You find out by looking at them.

The chapter says the same thinking works for many kinds of business, especially ones that sell products or deliver experiences. The product breaks into factors that fall into a small number of categories, and you recombine the factors to make something new.

Other names for it

Outside the book the same technique is usually called morphological analysis. The chart of attributes and options is called a morphological chart, or a morphological box. The idea is the same: split a thing into independent attributes, list the options for each, and combine them. The Scavengers chapter calls it attribute listing, and this tool uses that name.

Why change one thing at a time

When you change a single attribute, everything else stays the same, so you can tell what the change did. Moving a restaurant from table service to home delivery is a question you can answer. Changing all four attributes at once is harder to read, because you cannot tell which change helped.

Shuffle all is the book’s random pick, and it gives bigger jumps. Use it when one-at-a-time changes start to feel safe, or when you are stuck.

Make your own chart

The ready-made charts are practice. The technique is most useful on something you care about, so build a chart for it.

Name the thing. A bicycle, a birthday party, a newsletter, your own business.
Pick three to five attributes. Choose attributes that vary independently. In the restaurant chart, the type of food does not decide the price.
List the ordinary options and the odd ones. The ordinary options give you a starting point. The odd ones are where the surprises come from, like the skateboarding waiters in the book’s chart.

The chart is saved on your device and is not sent to us. A chart you build cannot be shared by link, because the link would have to carry the whole chart.

Where the charts come from

The restaurant chart uses the book’s headings and options. We added one option, a waiter at the table, so the chart has an ordinary place to start. The pen chart uses the five attributes the chapter names, and the options are ours. The hotel, bookshop and gym charts were written for this site.

Questions

Is this the same as the Business Idea Generator? No. The Business Idea Generator deals four random parts and you build a pitch from them. This tool follows the book’s method more closely: you start from a real thing, list its attributes and change them one at a time.

Does it keep my work? Only if you press Save, and then only on this device. You can clear your saved list at any time.

How do I share a combination? Press Share link. The address holds the chart, the options picked and any locks, so whoever opens it sees the same combination. It does not include what you wrote.

Can I use it for a service or a product? Yes. The chapter says the technique suits anything that sells products or delivers experiences.

Attribute Listing Tool