Final Reflection

2) What sticks out to you as the most formative experience? The experience that you'll remember years later? What was your most joyous experience? What experience are you most proud of yourself for accomplishing?

Something I found very amusing was that when choosing the venture that we actually developed throughout the rest of the semester, I did not realize that we will have to stick with that one for the rest of the semester. I thought it was just one of the possible products I would like to pursue in the future. I very much enjoyed every reading and learning about entrepreneurs or social media. I am so proud of the countless interviews we had to conduct as well as the elevators pitches. 

3) At the beginning of the semester, I mentioned that I wanted each of you to develop an entrepreneurial mindset. Now, at the end, do you see yourself as an entrepreneur? Do you think you have moved closer to developing an entrepreneurial mindset?

Yes, I definitely think I have developed an entrepreneurial mindset due to the opportunities that I know see within everyday processes. There are so many opportunities for new products and business ventures to begin in order to solve problems people deal with on an everyday basis. 

4) What is the one recommendation you would make to the students who are going to journey down this path in the future? What would you recommend they do to perform best in this course? What would you recommend they do to foster that mindset?

Beware of interviews. Make sure to preview the blogs at least a week before in order to give yourself time to conduct interviews to get quality data for your product or target markets. Stay on top of the work and put as much effort into your blogs as possible. The more you put into it, the more you'll get of it. Throughout this class make sure to be very open-minded. You can learn so much from yourself and from other people you come in contact with throughout this class. Peer reviews are also a vital source of information.

Image shows how happy I am about this course!

Venture Concept No. 2

Opportunity

The biggest market for my product exists with parents of any age and their children; children being typically between the ages of 4-13. I will essentially be targeting parents because they will be the ones eventually buying the product, but I also need to make the product enticing enough for children to want to use it and thus telling their parents to get it. The actually need is that eating in the car is so unnecessarily difficult. Your lap is uneven making for placing your food in your lap between bites a big risk. The food could spill, crumbs could drop, and using dipping sauce is much more painful than it would be at a table. Sometimes parents calling out "Hold on!" when making that last minute turn just is not enough to save that box of nuggets. Parents end up having to spend their otherwise peaceful Sundays taking hours to vacuum every nook and cranny of kids booster seats and regular seats.

I think kids are more involved with extra school activities than they have ever been. With so many sporting opportunities, after school clubs, and general involvement with clubs, life gets so busy. Sometimes eating dinner together just is not a possibility when you have three kids, each with a different place they need to be. Instead of sitting down to eat, the only way to feed your kids is on the road driving from one place to another.

In terms of geographically defining this target market, I think the only factors that truly play into it would be access to drive a car (not a busy city that relies on public transportation). When looking into demographics, age is definitely a factor for children simply due to maturity. The age of the parents is not really a factor, but I would assume younger parents would be more interested in this problem as older ones might have a higher expectation for their child's eating habits in the car. This is definitely an assumption and not a definite fact in the market.

Currently there is not much being done in the market place to accommodate this need. Products have come out to assist in writing, coloring, or holding a laptop in the car, but nothing has really been provided successfully to assist eating in the car. With that being said, people might not be loyal to another product, but historically people are resistant to change. I would have to make sure there is a big enough need and I create a product that addresses the issue of eating in the car and do it in a way has an exceptional design and a great perceived value in order to be successful.

This opportunity is utterly huge! Think of how many families there are worldwide that have children involved in extracurriculars. Even if they are not extremely involved, there are also so many families who take road trips which consists mainly of having food in the car.

On top of the opportunity being huge, there are slightly fewer than four million babies born in the United States each year. Even if only one quarter of those are born into a new family, that is a million potential customers. There is truly no ending window of opportunity for this product.

Innovation

In order to make eating easier, I have created what I call the car table. It is pretty much what is says it is. You will no longer have to worry about spills from uneven laps or having nothing there to catch your food when it slides because of sharp turns. The car table with measure approximately two feet by one foot and feature three inch sides. The table will be able to fold easily to best fit in between the seats or underneath the seats depending on you car seat orientation. The table will also be fully customizable. Whether you prefer a classic black look or you child wants a colorful rainbow and unicorn design, we will offer it all. We want their to be an element of excitement around this product, whether that be because it is very aesthetically pleasing or the fun wild design. With the foldable ability of the table, it will lock in all the crumbs making for easy cleanup for the parents and no hours spent vacuuming out car seats. For this product, I will charge somewhere between $25 and $35 depending on the design chosen for the table.

Venture

My product solves many of the stated issues in the opportunity including: losing food during sharp turns (the sides of the table will now prevent this), not having a flat surface to set food or dip your food in sauces, and the issue of endless crumbs all over the car. Having no direct competitors, I will have to persuade my target market that this product will save them time and money in the future. I also have to convince children that it is fun to use this product when eating in order to entice parents to purchase it for their child. Price point, customer service, customer experience, and business location will be the most important factors of business. The price point will make or break this product. Because this is a new product, I have to price it low enough for people to be willing to try it, but high enough for people to believe the product is high quality. I will strive to have a very high level of customer service and live by the mantra "the customer is always right". My product is based off of simplify the customer's experience of eating in the car. If I do not create a great customer experience, then I have failed at creating this product.

Addition to Venture Concept:

Based on feedback, I will make sure to focus on licensing when looking into the future as it has been pointed out as a great opportunity after receiving feedback. I agree with the feedback given when they say kids often hook onto a character or cartoon and will want gear to match that character. I think this will be a great opportunity to tap into this market and the culture that surrounds it. The feedback also touched on my advanced thoughts about selling the company and I do not think that this mindset is premature. I think knowing your goals and where you want your company to be with help when building the company. I know that I must reach certain levels of production, sales, and overall partnerships with retailers in order for companies to show interest into buying us out. 

_______________________

First, my most important resource would be commitment to succeed as well as knowledge in both marketing and retail. Knowledge will put me a head above the rest and my commitment will take me to the finish line.

Second, I would love to get licenses in order to put marvel, Disney, and other characters on my products. The next product I want to make readily available to everyday consumers would be a charging platform for your car that allows you to charge it without plugging it in.

Third, after I have created my product, five years down the road I would love to have sold the company for a large amount of money and use that money to invest in other ventures.


Here is the only feedback I received on my Venture Concept No. 1: 

Hi Taylor,
I love the idea of getting licenses to have tables that have popular comic and cartoon characters on them. This will probably be the best way to attract kids. One thing I've learned from my younger siblings is that when children start liking something they really get into it and literally want everything they own to have that certain character. So that would be a really good move. I also find it interesting that you are already thinking about selling the company, it was not something I had in mind but it could be a really good plan if you think of something else you want to do later on.

Other feedback from "What's Next?" included the support of making the product available for lower income families and also pointed out how expensive a partnership with Walmart or Amazon might be. I would have to be extremely confident in my product. 

What I added to this blog is included under the "Addition to Venture Concept" section.

Reading Reflection No. 3

I chose the biography written about the Wright Brothers.

1) You read about an entrepreneur:

• What surprised you the most?
• I was most surprised about the reaction the United States had to the thought of the Wright Brothers actually flying. It was thought that humans were not meant to fly. In the end, the United States eventually believed in the value of the glider that the Wright Brothers created, but France was the country that originally invested into the Wright Brothers. 

• What about the entrepreneur did you most admire?
• I think that the overall perseverance of the brothers to continually work to create this glider is what I most admire. 10 years is a very long time to dedicate your life to one product. I think everyone is thankful for the determination they had when working throughout their life to accomplish what seemed to be an impossible task. 

• What about the entrepreneur did you least admire?
• I think this complaint about the Brothers is also attributed to the time that they lived in, but I do not admire the lack of recognition their sister received for all the behind the scenes work she did in order to support her brothers. From writing letters, massaging Wilbur’s legs, and getting the brothers properly dressed, the brothers have much thanks to give to her. 

• Did the entrepreneur encounter adversity and failure? If so, what did they do about it?
• They encountered many failures and obstacles throughout the process of trying to fly. Wilbur’s accident, their mothers death, the refusal of the United States, failure after failure when trying to fly, and many more. Throughout the whole process, they often relied on family and new breakthroughs to propel them into eventual success. 

2) What competencies did you notice that the entrepreneur exhibited? 

Knowledge, excellent memory and analyses, and tenacity. Their passion throughout their life in combination with those competencies eventually led to their success. It took ten years, but they accomplished something that had never been done before.

3) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you?

 I was definitely confused as to why the US did not even respond to the letter the Wright Brothers sent. I think it would’ve extremely beneficial to the US if they were on the forefront of this technology. Instead France got the recognition for initially investing in the first glider to take flight. 

4) If you were able to ask two questions to the entrepreneur, what would you ask? Why?

My first question I would ask is what was the initial thought that sparked the idea behind flying. The second question I would ask would be how did you overcome the challenges and obstacles? Being the first in flight would be Very challenging and I’m sure there were many obstacles. I am very curious to know how they embraced these challenges to be successful. 

5) For fun: what do you think the entrepreneur's opinion was of hard work? Do you share that opinion?

As I mentioned above, being the first in flight would be very challenging. The Wright Brothers failed many times before their first successful flight. If I were to guess, they would probably value hard work. I think the majority of entrepreneurs would put hard work as one of the most important characteristics to success. I also agree that hard work is important. The most successful people have the strongest work ethic. 

Your Exit Strategy

In the next five years, I hope to be selling my idea to a larger company for a large profit. I think my product has many opportunists for growth and expansion which will be appealing to potential buyers. I will also work to have already established relationships with big box retailers and Amazonfor a smooth and easy transition. I think a larger corporation could add a lot of value to my product through licensing and reduced manufacturing costs.

I have selected this exit strategy because it will lead to faster profits, which will be used to as investment capital to fund a new business idea in the future.

This exit strategy has influenced my plan because I have always had a large scale business plan even though I would be starting out as a small firm. I planned it to think far ahead and to make future business for the buyer easier. This should make the deal more appealing. I have planned to grow this product to be successful enough to intrigue larger businesses. Once I close the deal, then I can use that money to build another product concept and continue this process. Product development has always been a passion of mine. What follows after the development process, does not interest me half as much.

Failure

In the beginning of this semester, I experienced failure pretty quickly. When attempting to post some of the first assigned blogs, I wrote up the blog, posted it on blogger, but then forgot to submit the url that directs you to the blog post. This resulted in getting no points for the work that I completed. Being so early in the semester, I should have gone back and checked the directions to ensure that I completed the assignment fully.

From the experience. I learned many things. Always know what is expected of you. If I had remembered the tasks associated with submitting my blog post on canvas then I would have received credit. I think this can translate into the real world because missing one task of a project can have a very negative effect on the perception of the work you completed.

Failure to me is not always a bad thing. Yes, it can be very embarrassing at times, but you can often learn much more from your failures than from your successes. I choose to accept failure, learn from it, and then move forward with a positive attitude. I am pretty good at controlling my emotions through hard times and staying level headed. I do not think this class has taught me much about failure, but I think I will be more willing to take larger risks as long as they are very thoroughly calculated.

What's Next?

Existing Market

I think the next main thing for the car table would be to obtain licenses to wrap my product with children's favorite characters. Especially for children ages 4-10, I think this would greatly increase sales and overall perception of my product.

When asking my current market what they people I am not doing with my product, they answered to think bigger in terms of car accessories. I got suggestions of everything from car air fresheners to seat covers to storage for electronics used in the car.

Moving forward, I did like the idea of creating better storage for the car, but did not very much seem interested in either the car air fresheners or seat covers.


New Market

I have chosen to target a typically poorer market. Whether that be college kids or low income homes, many homes that belong to these individuals do not have an ice maker in their fridge. Instead, they must buy bags of ice or use ice trays that never seem to be full or take way to long to freeze. I want to make an affordable ice maker that is fast and small in size to fit in any size refrigerator.

After interviewing two people, both seemed very interested in the concept I had developed. They desired the ease of having a ice maker in the fridge without having to invest a lot of money into buying a new refrigerator. They mentioned that the ice maker should be small inside and there needs to be a lot of research done on the exact shape since many freezers are different sizes.

This new market definitely has a lot of new opportunities. There might actually be some overlap with my old market depending on the income of the families. I think I would have to work very hard to make this product extremely enticing for low income families to be willing to invest in this concept. I think if I partnered with Walmart or Amazon, there would be a potential for great success due to the streamline of production.

Putting it All Together: Awesom - table

Opportunity

The biggest market for my product exists with parents of any age and their children; children being typically between the ages of 4-13. I will essentially be targeting parents because they will be the ones eventually buying the product, but I also need to make the product enticing enough for children to want to use it and thus telling their parents to get it. The actually need is that eating in the car is so unnecessarily difficult. Your lap is uneven making for placing your food in your lap between bites a big risk. The food could spill, crumbs could drop, and using dipping sauce is much more painful than it would be at a table. Sometimes parents calling out "Hold on!" when making that last minute turn just is not enough to save that box of nuggets. Parents end up having to spend their otherwise peaceful Sundays taking hours to vacuum every nook and cranny of kids booster seats and regular seats.

I think kids are more involved with extra school activities than they have ever been. With so many sporting opportunities, after school clubs, and general involvement with clubs, life gets so busy. Sometimes eating dinner together just is not a possibility when you have three kids, each with a different place they need to be. Instead of sitting down to eat, the only way to feed your kids is on the road driving from one place to another.

In terms of geographically defining this target market, I think the only factors that truly play into it would be access to drive a car (not a busy city that relies on public transportation). When looking into demographics, age is definitely a factor for children simply due to maturity. The age of the parents is not really a factor, but I would assume younger parents would be more interested in this problem as older ones might have a higher expectation for their child's eating habits in the car. This is definitely an assumption and not a definite fact in the market.

Currently there is not much being done in the market place to accommodate this need. Products have come out to assist in writing, coloring, or holding a laptop in the car, but nothing has really been provided successfully to assist eating in the car. With that being said, people might not be loyal to another product, but historically people are resistant to change. I would have to make sure there is a big enough need and I create a product that addresses the issue of eating in the car and do it in a way has an exceptional design and a great perceived value in order to be successful.

This opportunity is utterly huge! Think of how many families there are worldwide that have children involved in extracurriculars. Even if they are not extremely involved, there are also so many families who take road trips which consists mainly of having food in the car.

On top of the opportunity being huge, there are slightly fewer than four million babies born in the United States each year. Even if only one quarter of those are born into a new family, that is a million potential customers. There is truly no ending window of opportunity for this product.

Innovation

In order to make eating easier, I have created what I call the car table. It is pretty much what is says it is. You will no longer have to worry about spills from uneven laps or having nothing there to catch your food when it slides because of sharp turns. The car table with measure approximately two feet by one foot and feature three inch sides. The table will be able to fold easily to best fit in between the seats or underneath the seats depending on you car seat orientation. The table will also be fully customizable. Whether you prefer a classic black look or you child wants a colorful rainbow and unicorn design, we will offer it all. We want their to be an element of excitement around this product, whether that be because it is very aesthetically pleasing or the fun wild design. With the foldable ability of the table, it will lock in all the crumbs making for easy cleanup for the parents and no hours spent vacuuming out car seats. For this product, I will charge somewhere between $25 and $35 depending on the design chosen for the table.

Venture

My product solves many of the stated issues in the opportunity including: losing food during sharp turns (the sides of the table will now prevent this), not having a flat surface to set food or dip your food in sauces, and the issue of endless crumbs all over the car. Having no direct competitors, I will have to persuade my target market that this product will save them time and money in the future. I also have to convince children that it is fun to use this product when eating in order to entice parents to purchase it for their child. Price point, customer service, customer experience, and business location will be the most important factors of business. The price point will make or break this product. Because this is a new product, I have to price it low enough for people to be willing to try it, but high enough for people to believe the product is high quality. I will strive to have a very high level of customer service and live by the mantra "the customer is always right". My product is based off of simplify the customer's experience of eating in the car. If I do not create a great customer experience, then I have failed at creating this product.

_______________________

First, my most important resource would be commitment to succeed as well as knowledge in both marketing and retail. Knowledge will put me a head above the rest and my commitment will take me to the finish line.

Second, I would love to get licenses in order to put marvel, Disney, and other characters on my products. The next product I want to make readily available to everyday consumers would be a charging platform for your car that allows you to charge it without plugging it in.

Third, after I have created my product, five years down the road I would love to have sold the company for a large amount of money and use that money to invest in other ventures.