 |
|
|
|
|
Wednesday February 9 2011 |
Letter from the Editor - Edition 81 |
What Did You Ship in 2010?
You can have all the best ideas in the world, you can innovate, you can have wonderful customer service, you can have the best knowledge, the most sophisticated systems and even the best people, but if you don't sell something....none of it matters. Arguably the worlds greatest marketing blogger and author, Seth Godin, recently sent out a New Year blog asking the question, 'What did you ship in 2010'? I really liked this question as it made me take a moment to think about what I had personally "shipped" in 2010. Because we are so future orientated these days we don't often take time to reflect on the past. Generally, as soon as we welcome the start of a new year we start focusing on resolutions, goals and objectives for the year ahead and quite often the things we have achieved the previous year are forgotten. I believe it's worth taking a moment, as I have, to reflect on the
last year and make some notes about some of the things that you shipped - ie what you achieved and what things went right for you in the past year. You will probably surprise yourself with just how much you achieved in 2010! Reflection is an important part of the learning process and in most cases can make you feel good about what you have achieved and therefore motivate you for the year ahead. Before you dive into 2011 (if you have not already) get a blank piece of paper (ideally in the journal that you have) and write one page on what you shipped in 2010.
|
Food |
The Chef Next Door
In the last few months we have often spoken of crowd-sourcing, where you use the power of your audience or community to drive your business. There is also no questioning the enormous impact reality shows like Master chef and My Kitchen Rules have had on not only viewing audiences, but also amateur chefs. So now Dutch site TweetjeMe, which is aimed at amateur chefs, helps people sell home cooked meals and desserts to others who live nearby to them. You simply sign up with TweetjeMe
and the neighbourhood chefs can upload their pictures and descriptions of the meal that they are offering for sale. They simply list what they are cooking and when people should pick them up. Of course there is also the price. The customer then selects the meal and the neighbourhood, pays TweetjeMe and picks up the food at the agreed time. Naturally
TweetjeMe takes a cut but the rest goes to the chef. They are also clever in that they give a cut of the proceeds to local charity The Hunger Project a global non- profit organisation committed to ending world hunger. Very clever. These ideas of crowdsourcing keep spreading and we hope this influences every business to step back and think about what they could do to have their clients, customers, audience or tribe interact with their business in some way to help generate further business. With the TweetjeMe idea above there is sure to be the sceptics concerned about OH&S, but for smart entrepreneurs this won't stand in the way of a great idea.
|
Transport |
Plug In and Fill Me Up
Will there be a time in the future where electric cars will dominate the streets? Audi believe that it's not that far away. Recently at Design Miami
Audi debuted a concept electric car filling station. This uber-cool building aims to provide a space where owners of electric vehicles can stop and spend time while their car is recharging. Because it can take up to an hour to recharge, the filling station provides a cafe and lounge, organic foods, healthy beverages and so on. The design is set up more like a living room complete with bookcase and bar. Will this kind of filling station finally be a place where, whilst the car charges, we recharge our brain by reading, thinking, scribbling, doodling and writing? Or will it be just another Qantas Club filled with overworked, stressed and frazzled executives making love to their Crack-berries? Either way we think it's cool.
|
Pop-Up |
Baby Boomer Pop-Up
Last year we wrote a lot about the growing trend of pop-ups and how this retail concept is spreading into all sorts of industries and categories including the service industry. So when we saw the pop-up MedCottage we thought it was worth highlighting. Essentially because our society is ageing, more and more businesses will be aiming themselves more at the senior citizens. So now Virginia based N2Care has come up with the MedCottage
pop-up. It is a fully equipped medical facility that can be set up at the home of a senior citizen to help take care of their health. It's been likened to a house style RV that can be set up next to the home of the person who needs care. The MedCottage
uses their electricity and water supplies only, and it's full of technical amenities to improve the health, comfort and safety of the elderly or even those recovering from illness or injury. It is essentially a hospital style facility on wheels that can be moved from place to place to provide necessary home care services for those in need of it.
|
|
A Rack Of Veggies
We have often talked about brands winning in the battle of category and last year we reported on the meat industry and luxury butcher shops. Well, the latest innovation is The Vegetarian Butcher. Developed by the Dutch, ButcherShop
operates exactly the same way as a normal butcher only it's dedicated to vegetarians. The main product is its own line of Lupin based, protein rich products developed by their own team of Dutch scientists and chefs. It is pitched at those with money to spend, as you can imagine how much work needs to go into creating a meat substitute in a facility like a butcher shop. However there is definitely a market for it, it's a new category, it seems to be unexplored and you can be guaranteed to see these things popping up around the place soon.
|
|
Them Boots Were Made for Cleaning
OK this may be a little bit out there but hey....that's what we're all about! The Foki is a floor cleaning concept shoe made by Indonesian designer Adicca. Designed for a competition these shoes actually do exist. Each shoe is equipped with pads attached to its sole, that cleans the floor of dust and dirt as you walk. Basically you just stick them on your feet and they are working. The Foki
is powered by a rechargeable battery and comes complete with an LED display on the side that show clean levels and even battery status. Not sure if they will take off but either way it's pretty innovative and certainly a bonus for all those time poor, multi- tasking, clean freaks out there.
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
