????今年夏天最熱門的既不是哪一支男子樂團(tuán)，也不是價格昂貴的美國娃娃玩具，而是編織。

????全美國九歲的小女孩們都被一種幾個世紀(jì)以前的工藝所深深吸引。她們在一臺臨時編織機(jī)的幫助下編織著七彩的手鏈。只是這一次她們要用的是橡皮筋，很多很多的橡皮筋。

????從八月份的第一周開始，手工藝品零售商Michaels Stores便開始引進(jìn)17美元的彩虹編織機(jī)（Rainbow Loom）。如今，Michaels品類管理高級副總裁費(fèi)羅?帕帕斯稱，這款產(chǎn)品的熱銷程度是該連鎖店第二暢銷產(chǎn)品的十倍。

????據(jù)該產(chǎn)品45歲的發(fā)明者吳昌俊（音譯）透露，這款橡皮筋手織機(jī)在多家零售店已經(jīng)賣出了100萬件左右。不久之前，吳昌俊還是底特律日產(chǎn)汽車公司（Nissan Motor Co.）的一名資深碰撞試驗(yàn)工程師。

????三年前，吳昌俊的兩個女兒——12歲的特蕾莎和9歲的米歇爾——正在家里的小房間用橡皮筋做手鏈。這個畫面讓馬來西亞長大的吳昌俊想起了用橡皮筋做跳繩的場景。吳昌俊希望能用編手鏈的水平來打動孩子們，于是他抓起一些橡皮筋，努力想把它們編織成圖案。結(jié)果他的手太大，而橡皮筋又太小。

????于是這位工程師來到自己的車庫，拼裝出了一臺樣式古老的織機(jī)——其實(shí)就是一塊舊木板上面釘了幾排圖釘。憑借這個簡單的工具，他開始把橡皮筋纏成手鏈。最初，他的兩個女兒并不感興趣。但后來，她們看到他飛快地織出復(fù)雜的花紋，她們改變了之前的看法。

????特蕾莎發(fā)現(xiàn)了將這個小東西變成商機(jī)的可行性。當(dāng)時她們鄰居家的孩子們都開始迷戀爸爸組裝的織機(jī)。就是在那時候，吳昌俊信心大增——雖然有一點(diǎn)負(fù)罪感——他決定把攢出來供女兒上大學(xué)的10,000美元拿出來，打造一款可以上市銷售的產(chǎn)品。

????他花了六個月時間改進(jìn)設(shè)計(jì)。（目前店鋪內(nèi)銷售的是第28代。）然后他開始在中國南方省份尋找供應(yīng)商，并于2011年6月拿到了第一批貨。當(dāng)時，橡皮筋早已到貨。他還記得當(dāng)時與妻子站在車庫里，忐忑不安地看著那個巨大的板條箱：箱子有2,000磅重，相當(dāng)于一輛小汽車的重量。

????最初的銷售非常緩慢。他去參加貿(mào)易展和兒童夏令營，推銷自己的塑料編織機(jī)。那時，吳昌俊親自去商店推銷，但卻經(jīng)常被店鋪經(jīng)理轟走。

????2012年7月，他終于迎來了轉(zhuǎn)折點(diǎn)。當(dāng)時The Learning Express Toys連鎖店的一家店鋪看中了吳昌俊的發(fā)明。這家位于喬治亞州阿爾勒特的店鋪專門推出了手鏈編織課，介紹這款廉價織機(jī)的功能。吳昌俊說：“突然，他們給我打電話說，一周賣了24件。后來，一周賣了96件。”接下來，孩子們開始帶著織機(jī)來到學(xué)校，于是網(wǎng)絡(luò)效應(yīng)開始發(fā)揮作用。

????The hottest tween frenzy this summer isn't a boy band or an excessively priced American Girl doll accessory. It's, well, weaving.

????Nine-year-old girls across the U.S. have apparently fallen head over heels for a centuries-old craft form, threading together colorful bracelets with the aid of a makeshift loom. Okay, this time, rubber bands are involved. Lots of them.

????Michaels Stores, the huge, private arts-and-crafts retailer, began stocking the $17 Rainbow Loom in the first week of August. The kit is now selling ten times better than the chain's next kids bestseller, says Philo Pappas, Michaels' Executive Vice President of Category Management.

????Already, a million or so of the rubber-band hand looms have sold through various outlets, according to Cheong-Choon Ng, the product's 45-year-old inventor, who until recently was a senior crash-test engineer for Nissan Motor Co. (NSANY), in Detroit.

????Three years ago, Ng's two daughters—Teresa, then 12, and Michelle, then 9—were sitting in the family den making bracelets from rubber bands. The process reminded Ng, who grew up in Malaysia, of making jump ropes from rubber bands as a child. Hoping to impress his kids with his bracelet-weaving skills, he grabbed a few tiny elastic bands and tried to mesh them into a pattern. They were too small for his fingers, however.

????So the engineer went to his garage and cobbled together a primitive loom—an old wooden board lined with rows of pushpins. With that, he began looping rubber bands into bracelets. At first his daughters weren't impressed. But once they saw him weaving intricate patterns in breakneck speed, they changed their mind.

????It was Teresa who saw the potential for transforming this into a business, when other kids in their Novi, Mich., neighborhood began obsessively playing with the looms Dad was assembling. That was when Ng decided to take a leap of faith—guilt-ridden though it was—staking the $10,000 he managed to save for his daughters' college fund on building a marketable product.

????He spent six months refining the design. (The kit that's in shops today is the 28th iteration.) Then he set about finding suppliers in Southern China, getting their first shipment in June 2011. By then, the rubber bands had already arrived. He remembers standing with his wife, staring fearfully at the giant crate in their garage: it weighed 2,000 pounds, as much as a small car.

????Sales were glacially slow at first. He went to trade shows and children's camps to show off the plastic loom. When Ng went to pitch store managers in person, he was often asked to leave.

????That changed after a single store in The Learning Express Toys chain picked up Ng's invention in July 2012. The shop, in Alpharetta, Georgia, offered bracelet-making classes to show off what could be done with the inexpensive loom. "Suddenly, they were calling us, saying they sold out 24 products in one week," says Ng. "Then they sold out 96 pieces within a week." Then, when kids started taking their kits to school, good old network effects kicked in.