I love this particular pearl of wisdom from Seth Godin. Great lesson in marketing a difficult to love product.
"The story goes that James Cook brought fermented German cabbage with him on a long voyage, an innovative way to combat scurvy.
He knew that getting his sailors to eat this strange and stinky food was going to be difficult, particularly since scurvy is a long-term problem, not something you want to try to solve after you get it.
His answer was based on recognizing the power of status roles and is widely applicable:
For the first two weeks of the journey, only the captain and the officers were allowed to eat sauerkraut.
Demand creation through status roles has a long history, apparently."
credit: Seths Blog
I think the same 'pearl' could be applied to Oysters and Caviar. 
