30A – Final Reflection

My most formative experience was when we were going through the different news articles to search for opportunities. I had never thought of thinking of the new and problems as in the context of being entrepreneurial opportunities for me solve. It really helped shift my perspective and brought my thinking closer to the entrepreneurial mindset.

The experience I’ll remember years later is when I had to make multiple phone calls to experts in order to interview them. It was rough having to interview experts, since you had to locate them and try to contact people who are difficult to be contacted. There’s a sense of failure and rejection you will ultimately face when doing so.

My most joyous experience was when I was developing my first idea of seaweed. I really liked the idea as a concept and thought that the entire think worked really well as a whole to solve two problems at the same time. The ideas relevance to me by being in my locality inspired more enthusiasm on my part when I was researching it.

The experience I’m most proud of myself for accomplishing is the elevator pitches. It helped me develop my speaking skills and present my ideas concisely and clearly.

I do see myself as more an entrepreneur than I had before. I don’t think I would fully consider myself as an entrepreneur yet, but I have made definite progress. I feel myself moving in the direction of an entrepreneur.

I think I have moved closer to developing an entrepreneurial mindset throughout completing all the assignments in this course.  The constant interviewing really helped build my interpersonal skills and my interviewing skills. I have also started to look at the world in a different way.

I would recommend to future students to take the quizzes immediately after watching the lectures while the content is still fresh in their mind. It really helps when answering very specific questions based on small parts of the lecture.

I would recommend for them to start earlier and not underestimate how long it takes to acquire interviews. I would also suggest to list out all the specific requirements of the assignment so they can make sure to fulfill all the criteria. It is also helpful in overcoming the overwhelmingness of an assignment by breaking it down into the minutia of its steps.

To best foster their entrepreneurial mindset, I would suggest to think of problems in the sense of opportunities for them to solve. I would tell them to ask themselves how they could fulfill the unfulfilled needs of others.

29A – Venture Concept No. 2

1 VENTURE CONCEPT

• Opportunity:
• According to the US department of energy LED lights are the most efficient form of lighting yet have only reached 12.6% market penetration in the US as of 2016
• According to the US department of energy the average American using incandescent lights could save $75 a year replacing only their 5 most used bulbs, the average American home has 45 lights  and switching them all to LED’s to incandescents would save $230 a year in lighting costs.
• Stagnating wages have led to a need to save money for the average American
• The forces in the environment that created this opportunity were advances in efficient LED light technology, decreasing costs as technology develops, climate change, changing societal attitudes towards waste, greater awareness for the environment, stagnating wages in the American middle class.
• The window of opportunity is open until the switch to LED lighting reaches the masses, according to the diffusion of innovations chart we are entering the early majority phase. Therefore, I estimate my business to be profitable for the next 6 years.
• The opportunity is large and the entire market is worth $52 billion, but I am only trying to target a very small subset of niche residential needs that can be targeted through advertising. Based around the percentages of residential use and my target markets population size I  very roughly estimate it to be worth around $300 million a year.
• Customers are currently satisfying their need using traditional light or CFL’s because that was the last lighting break through.
• The window of opportunity will be open until market wide adaption of led lights, or when the late majority adopt them. This is around 70% market penetration.

• Innovation:
• For individual consumers I will offer a residential package that offers 45 lightbulbs for $60 and installation for $60 and it will offer in-house financing which is the key innovation that allows our business to harvest the savings of consumers who wouldn’t ordinarily make an investment in themselves.
• For businesses with different needs and a larger budget I would offer durable lights and more niche lights that aren’t as widely used as lightbulbs such as ballast lights, their installation and the general knowledge of what goes into that. The key innovation is the knowledge of the different electrical needs.
• Initial profits would be found with a very small $50 social media campaign targeting the key identifiers I found of someone needing this, being eco-friendly, older (or younger professionals), live in an older home or older side of town etc. This would also be used to refine and test if my interview collected information accurately reflects reality and the market at large.

• Venture Concept:
• Individuals will buy my product if they are concerned about the environment, are price conscious of their electric bill, are looking to save money, or need to replace dying lights
• Businesses will buy my product to decrease their operational costs and thus increase their net profits, they could also buy it to signal social initiative/responsibility. Due to the developing social and environmental consequences there’s a push for companies to be ethical and show they care about society/the environment. Modern day branding attempts almost try to humanize the corporation as an entity and signalling their values is integral to this marketing. Many companies are switching to green energy, this achieves the same goal as that by reducing pollution by reducing consumption.
• Online individuals will buy my product in order to be socially and environmentally conscious
• The major competitors are Home Depot, Lowes, and Amazon
• Price points: The price point will be based on the cost of goods sold, value of the convenience I provide, number of goods sold per customer, the savings I enlighten people about, the financing as well as competitors prices. They will be priced around $60 for 45 lightbulbs and $15 for 10 lightbulbs. Installation will cost $60 as well.
• Distribution: Ideally it will be initially online. There will be a webpage powered by shopify, possibly a blog and an account for the most important social networks. LED Lightbulbs bought in bulk from China will be repackaged with bulk branded cardboard materials. Labels will be printed and it will be shipped through USPS. Leads will be directed there by a targeted online ad campaign and by inbound marketing techniques.
• Customer Service: Plays a crucial role, convenience and customer relations are the lifeblood of any business to consumer type company. Also, my business’ blog and social media pages will be open to comments, critiques and advice from my customers.
• Location: It will mostly be based online, with the possibility of picking up the products in local stores until the ideal customer is confirmed; then a small location will likely open up in South East Gainesville by the apartments.
• Packaging:  Minimalist plain packaging based mostly around cardboard with no Styrofoam and minimal plastic and ink to really give the feeling and branding of of eco friendliness
• Employees:  I’m estimating around 1 employee to begin with in order to keep the company very lean and test the market and my assumptions, then if my business is successful I plan to hire up to 5/10 employees.
• They should be primarily skilled in online marketing but will do assist in the miscellaneous tasks as well.

•Minor Elements
• Unfair advantage: My unfair advantage are my public speaking skills, and my unique connections. My analytical thinking skills are also key in me identifying opportunities. The relationships I have built up with wholesalers and suppliers in the industry through this class and  the relationships I have built through UF as a whole
• What’s next: I want to reduce energy use, save the environment and generate profit.
• For Me: I think I tackled a very broad issue, next I would want to think of more innovative solutions to more local social issues so that I could more directly see my impact. I had an idea for seaweed fertilizer a while back and think I would want to look into that as a solution to the beach Seaweed problem we’ve been experiencing in Florida. I think I would be more driven to tackle a local issue than my initial issue.

2 FEEDBACK SUMMARY

For the “Venture concept No. 1” exercise I only received one comment, which was positive and approved my idea and how I described it, considering it well-detailed and realistic; but this comment didn’t provide any advice on how I could improve my business. However, I got some feedback from the previous exercises. The people I interviewed for the “What’s next” assignment suggested focusing on discounts, available if customers buy a certain amount of goods or with a bring-a-friend promotion. Also, other students suggested I could include younger professionals in my target group, without focusing only on older people; I was also suggested to think about the location of my business (if physical or digital) and I was told that an online store could be more profitable and reach more people than a physical one.

3 HOW I CHANGED MY VENTURE CONCEPT

I used the feedback I received and my further reflection to add some details to my venture concept, while I didn’t change the opportunity part. I decided to introduce discounts for the customers who bring a friend and for those who buy a certain amount of led lights, but I believe this discount to be more efficient when I target companies and not individuals. Customers will also be able to pick lights up in local stores, until I establish a small physical store in Gainesville. Also, I decided to work on the online presence of my business by creating a blog and different social media accounts, which will be managed by my employees but constantly controlled by me. I got this idea from the book I read for the third reading reflection, that is Inbound marketing by Brian Halligan. I believe if I used the inbound techniques described in that book it would be easier to target younger individuals. Finally, after reflecting about my exit strategy, I decided to hire up to 5/10 employees, but not more than this since I plan to keep running my business for the next six years more or less.