Final Reflection

After reading through all my posts from this semester, it is interesting to see just how far my idea has come since the end of August. All the little tweaks and tinkers have gotten me to the point where I am today, four months later. The experience I will remember years later is the Aha moment I had when coming up with this concept. I struggled greatly to think of a service/product to dedicate my time towards for this class, and I am beyond proud of the concept I have come up with. My most joyous experience was when I submitted my second and final venture concept. Summarizing an entire semester’s work into one essay was not easy, but I believe it perfectly highlights my service and the amount of time I put in to making this idea work. 

            I do see myself as an entrepreneur now that this class has concluded. I find myself questioning a lot of things I see, and always trying to identify a “need” that people around me have in any given situation. It is kind of annoying just how entrepreneurial my mind has become after this class to be quite honest. I definitely have moved closer to developing an entrepreneurial mindset and probably will never be able to get rid of the lessons I learned in this class.

            The one recommendation I have for future students is to take the time to choose a topic you are not only interested in, but have the desire to work towards. If you pick a meaningless topic, this class will seem like work. But if you select something you are passionate about, you will enjoy it a lot more and might just end up creating something that will make you money. In order to foster an entrepreneurial mindset, make sure you take each assignment seriously and look for the lessons being taught in each one. Make changes to your product, and keep an open mind. Read the comments on your post and always change based on feedback. If anything, learn to listen!

Venture Concept No. 2

1.                Over the course of this semester I have created a service that allows for the vaping epidemic to be combatted. Deaths and illnesses caused by vaping continue to rise every single day in the United States. With my service, high school and college kids are able to get rid of their vape in exchange for their information going into a registry and a discount on their health insurance. 

The opportunity I have identified is the vaping epidemic in the United States during 2019. Since the beginning, we have seen everything from Juul giving their employees $1 million+ each in dividends, to legislation being passed that bans flavored vapes altogether. One thing is for certain, vaping is dying out and young adults don’t have a structured way to get rid of their vapes if they want to. For those high school and college kids that don’t want to get rid of them, they haven’t been incentivized enough yet either. That is where I have positioned my service. I have targeted Americans between the ages of 18-25 that have a will to get rid of their vapes, as well as trying to incentivize those who do not want to get rid of them even after legislation has been passed. The nature of the need is to end the vaping epidemic in America and help our next generation become healthier and lead better lifestyles. Customers are currently satisfying this need by throwing away their vapes. Instead of throwing them away, my company will provide them a discount on their healthcare plan, giving them a reward for quitting vaping. The opportunity here is massive. Vapes became a huge trend in the United States in 2018 and 2019. Now that the current legislation has banned some vapes, along with the rising health risks being associated with vaping, the opportunity has only grown larger. However, the window will not stay open forever. If new legislation were to be passed furthering the ban, or the ban is lifted, the window for my service to thrive will close. In order to combat this unknown timeline, action must be taken immediately in order to ensure this opportunity is taken advantage of by my company. 

My service is innovative because no other service like it exists at the moment. It addresses a pressing need that can boost the health of an entire generation and end an epidemic that stains young adult’s livelihoods. My service will allow people to turn in their vapes to me, fill out some brief, secure paperwork with their insurance information, and in return they will receive a discount on their health insurance policy. Customers can stop by one of our regional locations to do so, or they can visit our website and do it all online. If choosing the online version, they will have to mail in their vape to our P.O. Box. While in this process we will not be making any money, the second phase of this plan will involve a business to business transaction. In order to make this idea profitable monetarily (by ending the vape epidemic, we are profiting from a humanity perspective), I will take my database that I have collected and market it to one of two business. The first could be a new company that is selling a product to help people deal with the aftermath of nicotine addiction. By having already done all the research for them by collecting a database of people who once had a nicotine addiction, I can sell this information to them. The other potential customer of this database are vaping companies. If the vaping ban is lifted and vaping companies improve their products, I can sell my database to these companies who are back on the market. How much the database will cost is not yet determined at this point, but it will not be cheap. An idea that has been brought up is repurposing the vapes and reselling them for profit. While a serviceable idea hasn’t been thought of yet, it is entirely possible that we could use the free inventory we are collecting to create an entirely new product to sell. 

            My innovation will solve the opportunity highlighted above by giving young Americans a structured way to get rid of their vapes that doesn’t exist yet, all while helping to save them or their parents money by getting a discount on their health insurance for making a positive lifestyle choice. It will not be hard to get customers who want to stop vaping to use my service. It will be more difficult to get customers who do not want to stop vaping to use my service, but the incentive might sway them. Kids who don’t want their parents to know that they vape can still turn on their vapes to us and receive the discount on health insurance when they are first purchasing it for themselves later on in life. As of right now, there are no competitors on the market that are trying to do the same thing as my company. To start-up, I will not need an employees to work with me. If the operation is a success, I will look into hiring dedicated people to assist me with the vast amount of information being sent to our company. 

The most important resource in this venture is my relationship with the generation to which I am appealing. Having a college kid run a business that provides a service for college kids will create a sense of familiarity and form a connection that I can take advantage of when marketing my service. The next opportunity I want to tackle is creating a product from the vapes that are sent to me that I can sell back to the public. This is tough, as I need to think of a product people want that is sensible and reasonable to make. As for myself, I want this company to have almost eradicated vaping by 2024, potentially expanding into a different country that has similar vaping problems In their population. 

2.    All of the feedback I received on my venture concept was overwhelmingly positive, reiterating how my idea has evolved from the beginning of the semester into a well-thought-out service. The only piece of constructive criticism I received was about how it might be hard to get young adults who are on their parent’s insurance plans to admit to vaping when their parents do not know. 

3.    With this feedback in mind, I came up with the idea of a “delayed discount.” Since some kids will really not want their parents to know, they can turn in their vapes to us and fill out or forms without their parent’s knowledge. We will then keep this information on file and give the kids access to their file when they are buying health insurance for themselves once off of their parent’s coverage. This way they can still enjoy the benefits of the incentive without their parent’s ever knowing of their poor lifestyle choice. It is a small change to my idea, but one that keeps my service open to as many people in my target market as possible. 

4.     

Your Exit Strategy

1.    My exit strategy is to compile as many vapes and people registered into my database as possible within the next 1-2 years. After this, I will then market my database to all big companies looking to sell a nicotine-related product to this demographic. Since I already have all the research on them, I believe a B2B transaction here is very possible. 

2.    2. I have selected this exit strategy because I believe vaping is a fad and will not last in the population. Products like Juul and other nicotine vapes are already under fire for multiple reasons, and now legislation is attacking them as well. Once I have taken the vapes out of many young adult’s hands, I will have solved the need they previously had of a structured way to stop vaping. Once a new company comes along with a product they want to market to this generation that relates to vaping, I believe they will buy my data instead of doing it themselves or getting a 3^rdparty to find the info I already have in my hands. 

3.    I believe my exit strategy has influenced my decisions in a variety of ways. The biggest influence is on the short-term life expectancy of my company. Like I stated before, I believe vaping is an epidemic, but a fad. It will crash just as quickly as it rose. And I will be here to catch the falling fruit, disperse it and go about my life onto my next product. Also, since my business is only making money after all the data is collected, I need the lifespan to be short so I can get to the point where I make a profit. Keeping the company’s life span short allows me to collect the data and sell it in a year or two, making all my efforts worthwhile. It also has influenced how I collect resources. Since I don’t have to buy any inventory or have my own money tied up in the company, I can afford to make the life span short and have no consequences or debt to pay for it. 

Reading Reflection No. 3

1.    For this assignment, I read Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow. The general theme of this book is looking into the human brain in order to better understand why each person behaves the way they do. A main focusof the book is decision making. Kahneman presents two basic systems of decision making. The first is System 1. System 1 decision making involves automatic responses that require no deeper thinking. For example, a System 1 decision would be picking up the TV remote. You do this quickly and usually without struggle, since your brain has done it so many times before and the pathways already exist. System 2 involves the slower, more cognitive decisions. It would be something like solving a puzzle, planning a wedding, and other more complex decisions. Kahneman also covers topics like choices, intuition, biases, and a fascinating look into what he explains as “the two selves” (experiencing vs remembering). Overall, his 5 main parts of the book combine to give an in-depth look into why individuals operate the way they do from a cognitive standpoint. 

2.    For me, the best connection I could make between this book and ENT3003 was when Kahneman referenced “The Law of Small Numbers.” So often we hear about the rags to riches story of an entrepreneur with a billion-dollar idea. However, as the law shows, these are not representative of the population. Millions of entrepreneurial ideas fail every single year, while only a select number make a ton of money. It is important to keep this in mind as an entrepreneur. As ENT3003 has shown us, failure is common and needs to be embraced in order to achieve success someday. You will fail a hundred times before you can succeed once. Not everyone can be a millionaire, but with hard work, and idea and the right state of mind, success is achievable. 

3.    If I were to design an exercise based off of something from this book, I would focus on Kahneman’s “Frames and Realities” chapter. Nowadays, it is easy for media outlets to make you perceive events in a different way than is reality. FOXNews and CNN can report on the same event in two completely different ways. In order to help students filter through the noise and find the truth of the matter, I would design an exercise that focuses on a recent event. The class would be separated into two groups, each with different agendas. They would then have to come up with a storyline that fits their agenda. After presenting, the entire class will be assigned with writing a report on the true events, without bias. This will help them see how news can be easily manipulated and framed, while being far from the truth of what actually happened. Getting students to think objectively and focus on the facts in any given situation will only help them in the real world later on. 

4.    The most surprising part to me was Kahneman’s Illusion of Understanding. He states that since we believe we understand the past, we should be able to know the future as well. The two problems with this are that: we don’t understand our past nearly as well as we think we do, and that the future is uncertain and very hard to predict. I made a connection to this point with a bias I learned about in another class, the hindsight bias. So many times, I have thought to myself “oh, I should’veseen that coming!” or “How did I miss that!” To me Kahneman’s Illusion of Understanding has helped me to seek to understand my past more, so that I can better predict the future and not make the same mistake twice. While it may seem simple, it was definitely the biggest “aha” moment for me when reading. And the best part about it is that it is something I can work on today.

Celebrating Failure

1. I failed most recently at my job. As the video coordinator for UF Women's Soccer, I am responsible for all video presentations for the team. At the SEC Tournament, the head coach wanted me to show a pump up video a few hours before the game took place. I was fully prepared, with the video, projector, extra speaker, etc. Upon starting the video, I realized the sound was not nearly loud enough. The room was huge, making the noise from my speaker seem mouse-like. It didn't have the right effect on the team, and the head coach let me know afterwards.
2. The biggest thing I learned from this experience is to not trust technology. Even if you have used it before and it has worked seamlessly, always show up early and test it out just in case. It is better plan ahead. As the cliche goes, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. The other takeaway from this failure is that while people might be upset that you let them down in the workplace, it is not a personal attack. You must remind yourself that, at the end of the day, you are all friends and will remain friends. Sometimes, the workplace causes problems. It is only if those problems carry over into your personal lives that it becomes a real issue.
3. Overall, I handle failure quite well in the workplace. I do not take it personally and I never make the same mistake twice. I always strive to be the best I can be, so failure can hit hard sometimes. But in the end, I always remind myself that none of this really matters and to not take life too seriously. Whenever I do fail, I make sure to make people forget about it by going over the top on my next task or assignment. This class has helped change my perspective on failure by showing me it is not the end all be all. Failure is simply a part of success. You fail everyday in pursuit of that one success. Failure is common, success is rare. You can't have one without the other. I feel as if I am more likely to take a risk now after this class.

What's Next?

Existing Market:

            The path that makes the most sense for my venture is to get the website up and running and start collecting vapes and data immediately. Vaping in America is a hot topic right now, and the window is closing each day in terms of being able to take advantage of this opportunity. My service in the existing market is B2C. Having local stops where people can turn in their vapes was unpopular, but it spawned a new idea. Instead of renting out buildings and creating unnecessary costs, it would be easier to just set up a tent in public spaces. Particularly college campuses, where our target market is located.

            By providing college kids with access to both an online and in-person place to get rid of their vapes for a health insurance discount, we ensure that all of our target market has access to our service. Many college kids are 100% online now, so being able to give them the same opportunity as students walking the campus each day to turn in their vapes is essential. This was not something I had taken into consideration before this assignment. This expands my existing market, college kids, without having to do any tinkering with my offer to the people at all. 

New Market:

My original assumption that a potential B2B opportunity would be present after a database was created of previous vapers was somewhat correct. Market research is a huge part of every company nowadays, many of them hiring 3^rdparties to do so. In my case, I’ve already done the work for them, so they wouldn’t need to hire me. It would be a simple, one time transaction for my database. The only potential problem with this new market is it relies on another company or product being created that does not exist yet. 

            In order for my B2B market to work, something else needs to happen in vape legislation for my idea to hold water. As the legislation stands right now, only flavored vapes are banned from society. If vapes do get banned altogether, a company could arise that markets a product that is a replacement to the vape. My data would work here, as they would target all the people I have provided my service to, previous vapers. If the legislation goes the other way, and the ban is lifted on flavored vapes, I am also in good shape. Now I can sell my database to the vaping companies who are back in business. While the ethics of this second outcome are questionable, the point remains that legislation would have to change again in order for my database to be profitable. If legislation doesn’t change, I am reliant on a new product that replaces the vape to be created and become popular so I can sell my database to that company. 

Venture Concept No. 1 (Bye-Bye Vape)

Over the course of this semester I have created a service that allows for the vaping epidemic to be combatted. Deaths and illnesses caused by vaping continue to rise every single day in the United States. With my service, high school and college kids are able to get rid of their vape in exchange for their information going into a registry and a discount on their health insurance. The name of the company is Bye-Bye Vape.

The opportunity I have identified is the vaping epidemic in the United States during 2019. Since the beginning, we have seen everything from Juul giving their employees $1 million+ each in dividends, to legislation being passed that bans flavored vapes altogether. One thing is for certain, vaping is dying out and young adults don’t have a structured way to get rid of their vapes if they want to. For those high school and college kids that don’t want to get rid of them, they haven’t been incentivized enough yet either. That is where I have positioned my service. I have targeted Americans between the ages of 18-25 that have a will to get rid of their vapes, as well as trying to incentivize those who do not want to get rid of them even after legislation has been passed. The nature of the need is to end the vaping epidemic in America and help our next generation become healthier and lead better lifestyles. Customers are currently satisfying this need by throwing away their vapes. Instead of throwing them away, my company will provide them a discount on their healthcare plan, giving them a reward for quitting vaping. The opportunity here is massive. Vapes became a huge trend in the United States in 2018 and 2019. Now that the current legislation has banned some vapes, along with the rising health risks being associated with vaping, the opportunity has only grown larger. However, the window will not stay open forever. If new legislation were to be passed furthering the ban, or the ban is lifted, the window for my service to thrive will close. In order to combat this unknown timeline, action must be taken immediately in order to ensure this opportunity is taken advantage of by my company.

My service is innovative because no other service like it exists at the moment. It addresses a pressing need that can boost the health of an entire generation and end an epidemic that stains young adult’s livelihoods. My service will allow people to turn in their vapes to me, fill out some brief, secure paperwork with their insurance information, and in return they will receive a discount on their health insurance policy. Customers can stop by one of our regional locations to do so, or they can visit our website and do it all online. If choosing the online version, they will have to mail in their vape to our P.O. Box. While in this process we will not be making any money, the second phase of this plan will involve a business to business transaction. In order to make this idea profitable monetarily (by ending the vape epidemic, we are profiting from a humanity perspective), I will take my database that I have collected and market it to one of two business. The first could be a new company that is selling a product to help people deal with the aftermath of nicotine addiction. By having already done all the research for them by collecting a database of people who once had a nicotine addiction, I can sell this information to them. The other potential customer of this database are vaping companies. If the vaping ban is lifted and vaping companies improve their products, I can sell my database to these companies who are back on the market. How much the database will cost is not yet determined at this point, but it will not be cheap. An idea that has been brought up is repurposing the vapes and reselling them for profit. While a serviceable idea hasn’t been thought of yet, it is entirely possible that we could use the free inventory we are collecting to create an entirely new product to sell. 

            My innovation will solve the opportunity highlighted above by giving young Americans a structured way to get rid of their vapes that doesn’t exist yet, all while helping to save them or their parents money by getting a discount on their health insurance for making a positive lifestyle choice. It will not be hard to get customers who want to stop vaping to use my service. It will be more difficult to get customers who do not want to stop vaping to use my service, but the incentive might sway them. As of right now, there are no competitors on the market that are trying to do the same thing as my company. To start-up, I will not need an employees to work with me. If the operation is a success, I will look into hiring dedicated people to assist me with the vast amount of information being sent to our company.

            The most important resource in this venture is my relationship with the generation to which I am appealing. Having a college kid run a business that provides a service for college kids will create a sense of familiarity and form a connection that I can take advantage of when marketing my service. The next opportunity I want to tackle is creating a product from the vapes that are sent to me that I can sell back to the public. This is tough, as I need to think of a product people want that is sensible and reasonable to make. As for myself, I want this company to have almost eradicated vaping by 2024, potentially expanding into a different country that has similar vaping problems In their population.