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Blog Week 11

After our class and the First Ladies have done research, conducted interviews, and developed insights, the process of idea generation takes place. Idea generation can be difficult because of the first and most obvious solutions. When we have a solution that we see works for other communities, it is easy to get caught up in those ideas. Like, just building a grocery store or starting a community gardens for example. While those solutions may work elsewhere, we must keep the social aspect in a social enterprise a priority to guarantee our business addresses the specific pains and gains of the community.

With that being said, before you start generation, you must address the pains and gains that a solution must fulfill for the consumers in order to prioritize or figure out which problems we are trying to solve to enable us to incorporate a fulfillment to these needs. We use this assessment to start thinking of what should be kept in mind for ideation.

In our groups ideation, we determined from our interviews and pains and gains insights that consumers lack transportation to grocery stores, budget for healthier foods, time to prepare and plan meals, and education of healthy meals. When thinking of ideas, we ask ourselves “what can be done so lessen these pains?”

One thing I learned in idea generation is in order to think creatively, you must think of solutions with no judgement. Even thinking of ideas that you do not think are even possible could lead you to a creative solution. Judging your ideas leads you to stay in the comfort zone, where the more obvious solutions occur. Thinking with out judgement allows you to think freely and drives innovation.

With the combination of our findings and examples from other solutions, our idea generation has changed from when we first started and we have begun to develop a more educational approach to our solution to address the generational lack of education that we found prevalent in interviews. Instead of just thinking of how to provide fresh produce, we have started to understand the core issue better and changed our ideation to try and teach community members how to cook healthier meals and how to incorporate children into the food making process. Looking at examples like farm fresh and hello fresh has also gave us insight into how we can have prepped meals or ingredients to prep our meals delivered to us or put in a place of connivence. This helped guide our idea generation into semi-prepped meals. Semi-prepped meals can help easily guide the First Ladies and other community members into healthy cooking because of the limited preparation time and instructions. These examples also helped guide our idea generation into the concept of delivery. This will ensure the food is accessible regardless of transportation. 

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Blog Week 8

This week we have completed our interviews and have problem discovery in the community.

The interviews allowed for a wider perspective of the issues of food insecurity in the central hillside community. A lot of what these community members said align with the problem discovery from the ladies of central hillside, but a widespread of information from the community allows for more insights.

One problem that seemed to appear was the definition of healthy food and meals. A lot of these community members just make the meals that they grew up with and know, regardless if it is a healthier option or not. Others have trouble incorporating healthier options into their meals because their children do not like it or refuse to eat it. Even if there was better access to fresh produce and groceries, there seems to be a generational lack of education on how to cook a healthier meal. This reasoning connects to why there may not be as much produce or healthier eating in the central hillside. This reasoning also gives proposition that the children in families could be part of the solution to grow up with healthier meals and educate in the future. 

Another problem discovery that was apparent was time to cook. Many of these interviewees have children and multiple mouths to feed. Due to parenting and busy lifestyles, community members have difficulty preparing healthy meals and purchasing produce because of the time constraint. This leads to families purchasing non perishable quick meals that may be packaged or frozen, rather than fresh. In order for these community members to eat healthier meals, we must keep in mind that our solution must help families to cook quickly to provide more family time and fit into the customers schedules. 

The next problem that was discovered in the interviews with community members was an issue that also surfaced with the First Ladies, transportation. Many community members have difficulty accessing fresh produce because of lack of reliable transportation to and from the grocery store. Many interviewees expressed that the public transportation system in Duluth takes too long to be useful for busy families. Many have to find child care to go to the grocery store. If finding this care is difficult, the interviewees have no choice but to limit the amount of trips to the grocery store per month. This leads to customers purchasing a bulk of foods the does not perish to preserve the longevity of meals for the family. Again, this leads to not so healthy meal choices for these families. Helping with better transportation or closer proximity to fresh produce could encourage these community members to chose a healthier option. 

In our classes interviews with community members, the main problems that were discovered were education, time, and transportation. These interviews provide insight into what our class needs to keep in mind when developing a solution. 

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Week 3

This week, we talked to the First Ladies about segmentation as well as problem discovery. 

The ladies talked about in terms of the customers who are they are looking to help. These customers are split into different segments of demographics, geographic, cultural, behavioral, psychographic, and benefits sought after. Based off these categories, the First Ladies of the hillside are looking to help large families, mostly single parents, as well as the BIPOC people in their community. These customers are people who often eat fast food or shop at gas stations or stores like Walmart or Aldi’s. Often the foods that these customers purchase are less healthy and contain more preservatives. The customers also use food stamps or EBT to purchase their food. The lifestyle of these customers are very busy with family life and jobs. These customers live in the hillside area and often lack transportation or time to and from the grocery store. The First Ladies are also trying to help customers with health needs or disabilities that may impact their access or ability to get healthy food at the grocery store. 

What surprised me the most about problem discovery is that the community wants to be healthy, but the EBT allows for limited purchases. So instead of splurging on healthy food, the consumers spend their money on cheap calorie filled food that is less healthy but fits the budget better. For example, EBT does not cover hot food. So, these ladies are most likely to purchase frozen food with preservatives to save time and money. Because even if these ladies want to eat healthy, they are so busy with their lifestyle that they do not have time to cook and prepare nutritious meals that fit the dietary needs of a household bigger than two. 

And even if these ladies have an idea of healthy food that they want to purchase, there is no where close enough where they can safely walk to and from due to most of them lacking transportation. Plus, they do not have the time to leave for a long period to take public transportation to the grocery store. 

When coming up with ideas, most of the ideas surrounded around a few key components. This solution should be convenient. This means easy access, simple, close proximity, quick, and delivered. The solution should also be flavorful and healthy, even farm to table. And, the solution should also be catered towards kids.

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Week 2

In visiting the materials on the origins of entrepreneurial ideas and entrepreneurial mindsets, I learned what it means to think like an entrepreneur. One aspect that I found very interesting is the concept of play. A good example of this was how the flute was invented simply for entertainment. This invention eventually led to the creation of the piano, which then led to the development of the typewriter, and then the computer. This shows me that it is not always about a problem and solution, but you can rather find innovation by looking at what is fun. This mindset will be important during the ideation of a solution for the first ladies. While we are looking for a solution, it is important to keep it light hearted and look for what may make people happy. I hope to develop more of a mindset where I look for what is fun and allow myself to play with concepts and ideas more. Another mindset that I hope to develop is also during ideation. I hope to learn to defer judgement when coming up with concepts. This is important because if you are always judging your ideas, you will stick to the mainstream and similar ideas or solutions as others. If you allow yourself to think freely, you may think of ideas that are outside of the box or out of the ordinary, which is a good thing. I have to remember that sometimes you have to think of quantity of ideas rather than quality. You can always develop the quality of an idea later in the process and save the judgement for after the ideation stage.

During the first discussion with the first ladies, I found that the most important thing was to listen and let them do most of the talking and ideation. If we are helping create a solution, the people who are most affected by the solution should have the most say. I enjoyed hearing their experiences and was able to learn a little more about their community and what their lives are like. They expressed some of their problems and concerns that come with food and produce in their community. What I found really interesting was talking to them about the statistics about the demographics in their community. Numbers on paper are one way to see what a community may be like, but hearing how they viewed their community and expressed how they saw some of the statistics to be different was really eye opening. For example, they felt as though the amount of people of color in their community was higher than what the percentage showed. This was the case as well for the amount of people without transportation.

In the next couple of weeks, I am excited to learn a lot more about these wonderful ladies and their experiences in the community. I also am excited about the artistic side of the first ladies and hope we can help create a solution that ties in their creativity and their care for their community.