Flex-Straw found its market in hospitals after a decade as a novelty

In the 1930s, Joseph B. Friedman, watching his young daughter struggle to drink a milkshake through a straight paper straw at his brother's soda fountain, built a working bendable straw by inserting a screw into a paper straw, wrapping dental floss around the ridges it created, then removing the screw to leave a permanent accordion-fold section.

The straw's real market wasn't people who could sit up and drink normally with mild inconvenience — it was people who couldn't. Friedman's company found actual commercial traction only once it turned to hospitals, where bedridden patients unable to sit upright genuinely could not use a straight straw at all; a bent straw for them wasn't a convenience feature, it was the only way to drink through a straw without spilling or requiring assistance.

Sold the same straw to hospitals, where bedridden patients cannot use straight straws, making the bend essential rather than a convenience.

Soda fountain customers saw the bend as a minor convenience, not worth paying for.

Hospital patients unable to sit up could not use straight straws at all, making the bend essential.

The product's core benefit was identical, but its perceived value shifted from optional to necessary.

Hospitals actively sought solutions for bedridden patients, creating demand without marketing push.

When a product feature is optional in one market, find an adjacent market where the same feature is essential; reposition, don't redesign.

Friedman's company made its first documented hospital sale in 1947, and hospital adoption established the commercial foundation that let the bendy straw later spread into mainstream consumer use, where it remains the standard straw design sold worldwide today; in 2001, Friedman's family donated his patent records and company artifacts to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.