Reflection - Learning Launch

Challenge

Because of COVID-19 the bakery had a major fall in sales, around 50% in the first month. They  were looking for cutting costs without compromising the quality of their products or their  reputation. The bakery, that produces French groceries, is well known in the city, with a  stablished brand and trademark, serving tasty treats in a high-end neighborhood. Every detail  matters, from the display of the products, going to packing, service, and now the hygiene  practices and safety procedures demanded by the pandemic.

Selection

The Learning Launch tool was selected to test one of the key hypotheses they came up after  going through a week of debate. This tool is ideal to test ideas using fast and cheap  experiments, instead of creating time-consuming and costly business plan, as showed in Frank Martin lecture. But in this case the bakery has the problem and the clients may help to soften  part of it.

Application

The hypothesis was that packing could be less fancy whether the buyer would be the final  consumer and provided that the products inside had the same quality. Most sales consist of  three items, usually each item goes inside a plastic box, the boxes go inside a personalized  paper sack and the sack goes inside a personalized paper bag with handle. It was decided to  talk to customers in order to get to know how important was packing when themselves would  be the consumers, explaining the test ongoing, and offering only the personalized paper sack.  If the purchase had another purpose, the fancy packing would be used as usual.

During a week talking to customers the hypothesis was confirmed. Clients not even ask about  price accommodation. In the first month the change generated a 65% savings in packing costs.  The test was successful.

Insight

What was a surprise is that high-end customers care about the survival of places they like.  They showed empathy with the concern of the bakery and, in many cases, it seemed they were  part of the bakery’s “board of directors”, helping to solve the issue. The bottom line may be to  share your concerns with all your stakeholders if you are in a high-end local market.

Design Thinking helped arising hypotheses and testing some of them, so you can use it for  different kind and size of issues, client’s and company’s. The design thinking approach was  interesting and successful, for the bakery and for me, because it worked. Not only because the  hypothesis was proven, but also because it took one week of experiment.

Approach

I think for testing a hypothesis, that one needs a fast and cheap answer, Learning Launch fits  the bill. The experiment not only reached the goal to test the hypothesis, but also created  empathy from clients. Next time I face an issue that can affect clients, I would give it another  try and be open to receive feedback from whom maintain the business.

