How do we apply learning launch tool in promoting mooncake?

Challenge  I am a member of my organization’s retail & event marketing team. I was assigned to a new project about  “Mooncake” and needed to work with a local mooncake supplier and designer to create our own mooncake  for selling to stakeholders and customers. This project included designing the mooncake and its packaging,  arranging delivery and storage logistics, liaising with different companies and external department, as well as  arranging marketing promotion. The key objective of this project was to sell all mooncakes before Mid- Autumn Festival and we only have 3 months to complete this project. Since it was the first time for my team  to sell mooncake, so this was really a big challenge for us.    Selection  We decided to apply “learning launch tool” to test the taste of mooncake and our marketing ideas. We aimed  to collect different voices from our customers, colleagues and stakeholders so that we would know what’s  works, what’s wow and how to modify our ideas.    Application  We applied 2 learning launch. The first learning launch was to test the taste of mooncake while the second  learning launch was to test the arrangement of a mooncake tasting chamber. We would like to see the  response and comments from our customers so that we could modify our ideas.    In the first learning launch, before we decided the taste of mooncake, we had prepared 4 tastes of mooncake  sample from the supplier and arranged a tasting session in our office. Over 40 mooncake lovers were invited  to try the mooncake samples and they would vote for their favourite taste. The mooncake taste with the  highest votes were selected for mass production. This learning launch helped us to understand what our  customers want and their preference.    In the second learning launch after confirming the taste of mooncake, we considered to launch a “Mooncake  Tasting Chamber” event during weekend to provide our own mooncakes and tea from our partners for  customer to try and we will arrange movie appreciation to engage them. As we did not have experience in  arranging this event and we were not sure if customers like this kind of event, so we decided to discuss with  our front-line colleagues and we agreed to arrange a small scale tasting chamber at the concierge 2 weeks  before official “Mooncake Tasting Chamber”.     The small scale tasting chamber had simple setup with mooncake samples for customers to try and it had  been hosted for 2 days. Customers were invited to join this small scale tasting chamber and we had  interviewed them in order to collect comments and advices for us to modify the operation and arrangement  of the “Mooncake Tasting Chamber”. This learning launch helped us to better understand what we shall  prepare for customers so that they will be impressed.    As a result, customers liked our own mooncake and they appreciated the tasting chamber which allowed  them to try the mooncakes before buying as well as provided entertaining movie appreciation for them.  Learning launch tool was effectively applied and all mooncakes were sold before the Mid-Autumn Festival.    Insight  Our biggest challenge was the first time to sell mooncake and arrange mooncake promotion activity to  customers in only 3 months. By applying learning launch, we understand the mooncake preferences of  customers and their needs. It helped us to create the products that most customers want which directly

helped to boost sales. Moreover, by applying the second learning launch – small scale tasting chamber, we  knew what customers want and don’t want so we could amend our plan to cater their needs.    Approach  I think learning launch is an appropriate approach for my team in design thinking process as our business is  B2C (business to customers). Nowadays, customers are looking for better experience and they will share their  opinions to others, thus, by applying learning launch in upcoming marketing campaign, we could test the  responses from customers and modify the ideas before official launch which helped us to save cost and time.

