The Great Journey

The Gallant Charge of Tired Souls

17/10/2020

The day is Thursday. Our team has been working non-stop on our report and I have a looming quiz. Who knew that this module would be so demanding? But, I have to push on and maintain a level head for my team and lead them properly. It's the least I can do. I am juggling between lab, work and this project, and the number of considerations are piling up. I have been in contact with my cousin quite a bit and he has been offering me counsel about how to make the product a bit more focussed. He also suggested to prepare for multiple bookings on certain days and that we need to have redundancies in our inventory. He's not wrong, and sometimes I do forget the transferability of my planning experience in the SAF to this context.

In terms of product development, Nanz and I have scoured Shoppee for the best prices and used measuring tapes to estimate the optimal heights for the tables and stands so that we have the perfect set up. It really does help to have her on our team as she really has good aesthetic sense which helps scope our searches. As for the other members, Anushka and Khushi really outdid themselves in terms of the webpage preparations. Their presentation of the information was really concise and well written so the only thing I really had to do was to add little buttons at the end of their pages to make the presentation flow more easily so that they don't have to scroll up and down when they complete their respective parts. As for Raymond, I gave him standing instructions to help with the formatting the report on top of editing his own content. Both of which, he executed perfectly. I guess in terms of running a business while still in school, having trustworthy teammates who gets the job done truly helps to alleviate the load and give me peace of mind as we cannot always be everywhere at every moment.

So... yesterday was the big day where we had to pitch our idea to Mr Chia and our classmate! I was first to the pitch and it was quite fun trying to inject some life into an early Saturday morning. Overall I felt that my parts went well, and it was interesting to observe how my teammates reacted in a physical presentation as compared to online. During the Q&A session, Mr Chia pointed out that we needed to be mindful of our various timings so that we capitalise on various discounts and also prepare our product accordingly. A few points were raised about various contingencies such as what happens if there is a last minute order and what happens if there is a food poisoning case. Both points were highly valid, and I do feel that the contingency planning should have been more thorough during the planning process.

As for the other groups, I did notice that they also were very explicit about their segmentation and targeting process. I felt that even though we did segment based on age, geography and budget, it was not particularly explicit even though we kept on harping on those themes throughout the presentation. On a personal note, I feel that if the narrative is clear enough, it may not be that necessary to add in aspects like the 4Ps and STP as they are presentation tools, and if you cover their aspects in a clear manner, I feel that the information conveyed would ultimately be the same.

It was also heartening to receive an offer to collaborate with D-3 and I think that even though there is not much marginal benefit to our venture since we may not really earn anything extra, I feel that as fellow tiny ventures, we should help each other as much as we can.

On a personal note, from observing all of the other teams, one key thing I concluded was that the key difference between a business man and an entrepreneur is that an entrepreneur finds a way to provide something EXTRA. Be it making a product or service more convenient, of make it more suitable for a certain type of consumer instead of merely providing a product or service.

So... what's the way forward? Well, we have to start actualising our plan, so I feel that purchasing our inventory and setting up our social media accounts could be the first real step. Also, dividing up the roles and responsibilities for our team should also be a priority for this stage too. Lastly, physically testing our the package should also be something which we need to do soon so that we can truly check the feasibility.

Tenacity, Discipline and a Dash of Problem Solving

22/10/2020

This is something I discovered in OCS and am getting reacquainted with as I progress through this semester. Though this is not that related to MiE, I still think it's worth a mention. For the last four weeks I have been working on a simple lab project - to insert two genes into a bacteria for research. However, due to my inexperience, every step of the way has been a challenge with at least one failure. These last two weeks have been the worst as I kept on failing but had no clue why until my mentor spotted the mistake. Now with that rectified, you would expect me to succeed and complete the experiment! But nope! Even after all of that, my experiment still failed and when I went back to troubleshoot, that has been failing. However, I realised that I had actually observed positive results at one stage and should have actually applied that instead of going back to step one. Hence, I should have worked smarter and not harder.

In addition to that realisation, I feel that the underlying message to this whole experience is that no matter what the setback is, I have to be tenacious enough not to give up and to always think of better ways to carry out my tasks.

Hey no kidding! Pumping balloons is really hard especially if you have no clue how much air to put into the big aluminium balloons without making them burst! So the whole exercise took us three hours to do, but that was because we pasted the decorations on blinds and had to transfer it to a wall. The whole experience setting up was ok and the following photoshoot was fine too. However, keeping the logistics was a major issue which made us consider about scrapping the rental idea as it would be near impossible to ensure that our customers preserve the decorations.

During this photoshoot cum feasibility test, we also ended up with the help of my friend who helped us frame shots and give creative inputs. I felt that this really helped it showed that having the opinion of an outsider who is well versed in the field is really helpful. Plus, it really does not hurt to ask others for help.

So with our new considerations in mind, we quickly revised our plan and crunched our numbers. We also decided that our current price was too low and raised the price to have better profit margins. Honestly though, I feel we would be fine with out current price because people would be willing to have the rented options. Also, I am pretty scared about what happens if people feel our product is too expensive since the price reflects total price and not a price divided amongst five people.

After revising our product, we hit another snag: we needed a place to store our logistics and distribute the packages. For this, I called on one of my friends to help. However, it does feel sadly artificial as in reality, we would most likely have to pay rent somewhere or really use someone's house.

Finally, we did get the instastories up after revising our plans and distribution aspects, but it still does not sit right with me as there are so many moving parts which have not been tied down yet. However, we just have to have a rough action plan, roll with the punches and adapt to whatever comes our way.

Just a random thought, why do people prefer to get married on 10/10/2020 rather than 12/12/2020? Anyway, today is our soft launch and that means that we actually have the opportunity for people to test out our product! I honestly do feel quite nervous as this all means that when an order comes in, I have to somehow juggle my full time lab commitments and this. Well, at least the minimum order thing is 5 days in advance. As for what is definetly going to happen, it will test our systems in place and see how we can refine them. It will also show how people react to our products which is definitely very important if we intend to scale up.

Sadly, I feel that our uptake will not be really high for the time being, so we will have to resort to special offers and discounts to get our first customers. I also feel that I need to push for our more targeted promotions for the international student groups to attract more customers. Also, something Raymond mentioned has been on my mind. He said that our group is very top down, and I agree with him. I just really have no clue how to turn it into a more spontaneous system until we get our first customer which will hopefully get everyone moving. Although, Khushi stepping up today has been quite refreshing with that burst on spontaneity, I do hope that more of the group can start stepping up and start pulling their weight since this is a team project, and we are currently living in a lull period of the school year. Meaning that when school picks up, we will truly need our teamwork.

The Great Stumble of Motivation

12/12/2020

It's been a month since we soft launched, the stickers are not done, the boxes are not here and there are no orders. It really is quite a dampener. A lot of me feels like just taking everything into my own hands and doing everything myself. However, I know that the true challenge of leadership is to make people work together. The only problem is, how? Especially when everything just feels as if no one wants to do anything.

I feel that to get around this, we truly need someone to purchase our product. I shall go and get the boxes, and will go and centralise the logistics in preparation for all of this, but it just feels so... slow? Pointless? Even I am having problems keeping my motivation up, and I need to think of the way forward for everyone to function.

I also need to go and contact the halls, sigh, sometimes I feel like I am to blame for this lack of motiivation? But is it truly the case?

The Way to Victory, is to Pivot About Your Axis

03/01/2021

Hey happy new year to all my readers (I wish) So we still have zero sales and that really sucks. Anushka is establishing contacts with halls and we have just finished our giveaway event where our winner was selected based on how beneficial she would be rather than on random balloting as we have to take every advantage which comes our way.

So as you already know, we have ZERO SALES! That really sucks and I feel that in addition to the lacklustre promotion, we also suspect that it is due to the low population of students in halls. So we really need to establish contact with hall council members to directly push our main package to hall residents. However, we all agreed that we need to pivot so as to at least boost our sales. Thus, we decided to think of doing special events in addition to birthday parties. During our brainstorming session one of the main things which was highlighted was that we have a storage problem. So to circumvent that, we decided to do a long order period for our next event: valentine's day! During this event, we will try to leverage on couples' desire to go out of the way to plan a special event for their loved one. We will also bank on some form of customisability in the form of photoprinting and calligraphy to value add to our product. Fingers crossed that this will work!

OUR FIRST SALE!

10/01/2021

It took a good month, but we have a sale!!! Albeit, a special order, but it is interesting in the sense that some people want our package but not necessarily with the cake. Thus, showing us that we should include that "budget" option for our package. I'll run the numbers to see the financial feasibility, but this could be a good pivot forward which is kind of interesting, since we did have a budget option in our original plan, but it still included the cake. Moreover, this is also priced much lower than all of our proposed packages, but interestingly it is still has about 30% profit margins. So if we could sell this and make this like our first point of raising awareness, then this would be great.

Oh yes, even though this is all well and good, we still do not have our packaging yet and that is on me as we dilly dallied and relied on the 5 day order period. So now we have to spend a bit more money to find a suitable package for our logistics. Hopefully, this all works well. As for the learning point, I feel that procrastination truly is the true enemy in this situation and we need always be more prepared than underprepared like we are right now.

Oops Our Engine has Stalled

29/01/2021

Well yes, it has been a few weeks since I blogged and it's mainly because nothing has really happened except for our packages getting stolen and perhaps the ideation of our Valentine's Day package. With regards to the V day package, it seems like a good idea. However, halls and schools are doing similar ideas to this and without the draw of "supporting our friends" or the legitimacy associated with school clubs, I do not believe that this would be a good avenue for sales.

We also had a consultation with our Profs and they made some good suggestions such as collaborating with dessert table providers, providing excuses to customers to throw random parties, and being party organisers. Honestly, I am more partial to the third option as we can be in full control of the event and even use up our old stock and also provide some business to our Bento Cake Burglar partners. I feel that we can use the ideas as springboards to generate even more new ideas or use them sequentially to even generate hype to potentially sell our original package ideas. Actually, this would be similar to Fortitude.sg which started off as an instagram account which just posted motivational and tough guy posts about the military before posting military inspired workouts and then breaking into selling military inspired workout apparel. It was a long process but I guess it is a good example of creating customers when there are none within that market. So perhaps they could be a good case study for us to use.

Wow! A Meeting in Real Life! How Quaint!

04/02/2021

So... our first meeting in person EVER! Gosh it was a great discussion as we generated ideas left right and centre! Our main considerations for these ideas really revolved around how to get more outreach, how to get more sales, and how to plan more activities for our brand. This resulted in many interesting ideas such as anti-Valentines Day in response to the massive uphill challenge of providing a Valentines Day package, a Hall decoration package for Hall Councils to decorate their Hall's hallways, and a cake telegram channel. These ideas were filtered from a myriad of drafts which were struck down mainly on the basis of logistical problems, and issues with time it took to implement. Another key factor was the question of whether these ideas were either business or academic in nature.

So for the anti-Valentines day party I feel like it is more of a business idea as we would have our guests pay a small cover charge for the party which would involve booking a cafe, providing cakes, and providing our own decorations. Moreover, I feel that this is an interesting pivot from being a party decorations provider to being somewhat of a party planner. In addition to this, it would also be a good opportunity to help raise awareness of our party decorations products and solidify our legitimacy as a business.

The other idea would be the provision of Halls with decorations to decorate their hallways and common areas. This would involve selling large number balloons, tinsel and latex balloons to Hall Council members at a reasonable price. This would be a relatively interesting approach because we would be shifting away from our original target group but I believe that we could still sell the idea of being party decor providers because in a sense by providing these items, we would be bringing some fun and in a sense a party to the hallways.

The last idea is mainly really academic in nature and it would involve setting up a telegram channel to broadcast and publicise our partner Bento Cake Burglar so as to help their business since we have not really been able to significantly contribute. Thus, we would be able to help spread their brand name and in doing so, spread ours too.

So we divided up the work individually and we've gotten to work, but if there is one thing I have learnt, it is to follow up on everyone's activities if not nothing will get done.

PS: we have finally received our replacement bags for the stolen ones

Another Day, Another Road Bump

16/02/2021

So we had this bright idea about hosting a party at Connect71 on the weekends and using our cake supplier's cakes so as to give her some form of business. However, it turns out that you have to have a minimum spend of $1000 and with our idea of roughly 30 people, that's way over budget. So on the other hand, we had this idea of linking up with this app called Not a Dating Site and possibly arrange an event for them where we provide balloons and possibly cakes.

As for the other endeavours, there seems to be some interest from the Hall Councils, so we have to follow up with that. If I have learnt anything from my personal experiences last semester, following up is an essential aspect in any deal. So I better prod my team members for that follow up.

WOW!! The End Draws Near, But My Time Has Not Come

09/03/2021

So we managed to get in one additional order in this week, which is great! We also spent the last few weeks discussing what to do about our remaining logistics and we decided to donate whatever we have left after fulfilling our last two orders to the Welfare Services Club. I think it's a fitting way to plan our conclusion since it would have the greatest positive impact.

As for the booth set up and the presentation, I think it is a good summation of what we have done and it adequately talks about our thought processes and lessons learnt. It is also a good chance to give our peers an opportunity to touch and feel our products while learning off other teams. I feel that that is one of the strengths of this whole experience, which is that everyone is a beginner and it is a summation of all of our rookie mistakes and accomplishments. Making it extremely applicable to us if we so choose to try our hand at starting up a business in the future. As we start to wrap up this course, I really think that it has shown what my limits are. It has been an extremely challenging period of time for me. FYP has thrown countless setbacks and my personal/family life has been thrown into disarray quite a few times, but we still have to chug forward. So I guess in a way, apart from being creative and brave, being an entrepreneur is also about being resilient and being able to carry on even when you have massive insurmountable odds in front of you from either your personal or work life.

Is It a Difference in Beliefs or Am I Deluded?

15/03/2021

So let's start with the good news first, we got an additional two orders for our package. One to a private customer and another to a hall! So that's great! I feel that this goes to show that for our model of business, we could have started with more so called cold-calling and asking people about whether they are interested in our package as such a method of promotion would be a lot more upfront and would leave a more lasting impression.

As for the business showcase itself, it felt really bad that we could not perform up to mark and that in the end perhaps our greatest failure was agreeing on a safe project rather than one which is less feasible but was more interesting. Even though it has not been the best performance, I still felt that as a member of a group I had to stand by my project even if we all had major grievances with it so I felt slightly let down when everyone did not support the project in the end. Alas, I do not blame them because in the "privacy" of my blog, I feel that I would not adopt such a business model again.

In hindsight, I really do feel that the only way we could have made everyone more enthusiastic about this project would have been to start the project with a greater spark through having a first sale earlier on (which I guess would have been made possible if we had adopted a different approach to our promotion strategy).

Even as we wrap up this less than successful project, I'd like to do so with some level of dignity, we actually have not been able to get the Welfare Services Club President's contact through my friend so I guess I will just do an official email.