Remember, Tama used to make 11" toms as well, so there was at least a wizened little shove towards odd sizes as a mainstream fetish/object. The main problem is that MOST drummers could give a rat's ass about the subtle nuances offered by odd drum sizes.
Consider this...
You already have some pre-conceived ideas about how a 10" tom SHOULD sound, as well as a 12" a 14" and so forth. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting a 22" bass drum in ANY drumshop, so THAT has become ubiquitous as well. Now...let's say you're a Bozzio drumdork like me, you are going to flout all of the conventional wisdom about what a drumkit should be, and have a go at it your own way (now we get to the root of MY drummer dogma). I'm trying to explore melodic textures using drums, so I go out and slap together a bunch of piccolo toms and make a diatonic scale of drums from "C" to the next lower "A". OK, they work, but the tones are garbage after I get beyond the mid ranges in either direction. The 7x8" that's pulling the low "A" is a bit too small to handle the note, but a 10" would be getting too "timbale-like" at that note. Likewise, the 3x8" handling the high "G" through "C" is making more of a "bongo-pop" than a smooth actual note, and even THAT little bastard wouldn't be able to pull that note without the six lugs that DW decided to put on the thing (personal experience; there's no way in hell you will get to those high notes with four lugs unless you are willing to RUIN your hoops, and even then, you are asking for trouble).
So, with 1" increment drums, I would be able to better dial in the tom notes I want for diatonic or even chromatic scales, without compromising the tone of the drums them selves. Yes, existing sizes could get the job done, but like Zappa said, 'Timbre rules", and there's no excuse for sacrificing good tone when the technology exists to solve this problem in some marginal way. The main reason this has not happened is (insert scary music) MARKETING.
The fact is, fruitcakes like me don't happen very often, so there just isn't the market for odd sized drums beyond what already exists, and even THAT is threatened by a lack of interest in these sizes. Unless we start getting more into specific notes and the desired tonality for each, we are probably stuck with the stupid sizes we have.
Thank God we have them, by the way. I would hate to enter that world of "This-or-that drumco. (LLC), will tell you what sizes you want---or else", but the time has come to reach deeper into the sound of a given drum, and see what music we can make, without an electric guitar in sight, and a wider range of drum configs will be neccessary to make this work.