What's the need? All over the world, the amount of people claiming to follow a vegan or vegetarian diet is increasing every single day because of exposure to new information that has them deciding to forgo meat and dairy products. Global trends predict that number to keep on rising. While the amount of meat-free and dairy-substitute marketed products are increasing, there is still a lot of frustration felt at the grocery store for these consumers because of the ambiguity of products' ingredient sources.
Who has the need? The potential consumer is someone the adheres to a vegetarian or vegan diet and is currently facing frustration with the ambiguity of a product's ingredient list. This consumer is interested in finding a way to make their grocery shopping experience easier and quicker. Young adults make up about half of the current vegan population.
What's the nature of the need? This need is created by the possibility of multiple sources of a single ingredient, either from a plant sourced or an animal source, and it is typically not specified unless the product is labeled vegan. This causes confusion for the consumer on which products are safe to consume, especially if they are new to following the diet and are not as educated on which ingredients to look out for or which brands are "accidentally vegan." Since there is a lack of clear communication from the product's label to the consumer, they end up spending more time in the grocery store because they are searching for an answer online with their smart phone or they are looking for another product that has easier to understand ingredients. Some of these consumers even feel forced to stick to the specially marketed vegan or vegetarian products to rid themselves of this issue, but they want to explore more options. This frustration for their current methods of coping has led to an unmet need and an innovation.
What is the app? As someone that began following a vegetarian diet 12 years ago, I know first-hand how frustrating grocery shopping can be. These experiences have led to me to develop a mobile app that will ease the frustration these consumers feel at the grocery store. They will no longer have to painstakingly go over each individual ingredient on a product's ingredient list, nor will they have to be restricted to the specialty aisle of their local Publix. This mobile app will cut down on the time spent inside the grocery store while allowing consumers to explore the rest of the store beyond the specialty products. To make this possible, the app will work by taking a picture of the product's bar code and comparing it to the large and frequently updated database of products to quickly tell the user if the product is safe to consume. In order to build an expansive database, a team of employees will be dedicated to researching a product's ingredient sources available online and from verifying with the manufacturer. To keep up with new product releases, the app will include a feature where users can submit new products with a picture of the nutrition label, and if it contains a questionable ingredient, it will be added to a queue for the team of employees to contact the manufacturer for a verified answer. To not produce any frustrating error messages, the app will include information on which ingredients are definitely vegan and which ingredients have ambiguous sources. This will allow the consumer to make a personal decision on if that product fits within their boundaries. The app will include other features, like a listacle section that will share vegan related news of the day and product promotions. The standard version of the app, called "Rad Veg" that will include ads will be offered for free. Our team of talented coders will work along trusted ad distributors to ensure a seamless incorporation of ads at optimal placements. A premium version of the app that will not include ads will cost $1.99 in the App Store and Google Play. Both versions of the apps will include sponsored posts that will generate revenue directly from grocery stores and food companies. To promote an honest and trustworthy brand image to our community, sponsored posts will be marked in an identifying way. We are dedicated to building a strong relationship with our users so that our sponsored posts will be viewed the same as normal content and will generate more clicks than traditional ads.
Why will they care? This app will make grocery shopping easier and quicker as it’ll be a useful tool that in a matter of seconds will tell the user if the product is vegan. The consumer will no longer have to look over every ingredient or stand off to the side of an aisle to Google if the product is okay to consume. It will be easy for users to switch to this app form what they were using before because the interface will be designed so that the focus is on being easy to navigate. The free version offers no risk and all reward for the user and the low price of the premium version will entice some users to forgo ads for an even more streamlined experience.
Who are the competitors? “Is It Vegan?” is the main competitor as they offer a bar code scanning app, but they lack a user-friendly interface, their ads are intrusive to the experience, and their database is slowly updated. My app is specifically designed based off their weaknesses and we will prioritize making our app the superior option. To do this, we will hire talented coders to develop and rigorously test an interface that is designed at every step to be user-friendly and attractive. To ensure ads do not disrupt the user's experience, we are determined to work with only trustworthy ad distributors and we will conduct research on how to incorporate ads as seamlessly as possible. Our database will be continuously updated by a dedicated team of specialists that will review products, an intelligent algorithm that will flag certain ingredients, and by submissions of new products from the community of users. We will dedicate a team to stay up to date on our competitors and their weaknesses so that we can gain a better understanding of how we can remain on top.
What about distribution, location, and customer support? As this is a mobile app, it will be available to purchase on the App Store and Google Play. The location will at first be based in the U.S., but with plans to expand internationally in the future. Customer support can be reached through a direct email inside the app.
How would you organize your business? We will start with a small team of about 8-10 employees, but with plans to grow as does the app’s user-base. We will focus on sharing job tasks among several employees to cut cost. Marketing agent, app developer, database administrators, and software specialists will be on the team.
PART 2
2) Provide a summary of the feedback you received from your previous venture concept description. You certainly want to include the student feedback, but you may also include the feedback you received from others during the "What's Next" exercise. You want to summarize all of the feedback, but be sure to place an emphasis on what people recommended you change about your idea. (In other words, don't just describe the positive feedback.) The general consensus of the feedback I was giving has been very positive and encouraging. I was told that my personal experience and knowledge of vegan consumerism is a clear benefit that I hold and have applied to my venture concept. Some feedback I took in consideration when editing my second draft was that I should really get to know my competitors so that I can understand just why it is that their products have so many bugs and aren't as utilized as I hope my app would be. Another point that a peer brought to my attention is the issues I may have with incorporating ads in a non-intrusive way. They recommended I look into grocery stores and food companies to directly sponsor posts within the app so that they may be more seamlessly integrated.
3) Describe how you changed your venture concept, based on what you learned from the feedback. Based on the feedback I was given, I decided to implement a couple revisions to my venture concept. It was a bit difficult trying to incorporate the idea of getting to know my competitors more in my actual venture concept, but I decided it was worth mapping out in the actual venture concept so as to show its importance to future investors and demonstrates how committed I am to making my app the superior option. In the "Who are the competitors?" section, I added a few more details on how my app was inspired by the competitors' weaknesses and how my app will overcome them. To address the second point, I added more information to the "What is the app?" section. I dive a little more into detail on how my app will prioritize less-intrusive ads and how the app will integrate sponsored posts to generate money in an honest, seamless way.
4) Include a picture (for illustration!).
(Free Image Source: www.pixabay.com)
