30A Final Reflection

1. What sticks out to you as the most formative experience? The experience that you will remember years later? What was your most joyous experience? What experience are you most proud of yourself for accomplishing?

I would say the best experience I had was doing the first elevator pitch. Making a video and having to condense my products description down yet still making it grasp the viewer’s attention was challenging.  After completing it I felt very proud of myself and felt like I took a huge step in my entrepreneurship path.

2. At the beginning of the semester, I mentioned that I wanted each of you to develop an entrepreneurial mindset. Now, at the end, do you see yourself as an entrepreneur? Do you think you have moved closer to developing an entrepreneurial mindset?

I believe I have always had that mindset that certain things can be improved on but until this class, I never knew how to expand on my improvements. So I definitely feel like I have a stronger entrepreneurial mindset.

3. What is the one recommendation you would make to the students who are going to journey down this path in the future? What would you recommend they do to perform best in this course? What would you recommend they do to foster that mindset?

At the beginning of this class, I thought it was going to be a lot of writing about something I’m not really interested in. The opposite happened though I looked forward to next week’s assignments because I was really having fun writing about my product and getting it ready for market. My recommendation would be to have a lot of fun and get behind your product. Act like at the end of this class you will become the CEO of your business in the real world.

29A Venture Concept No. 2

The Schoolcator

Opportunity: My potential customers are everyone no matter their age or ability who fishes inshore waters. These anglers know how it feels to do their homework and put their time in to locate then instantly lose track of a school of fish. The economy is on the rise and therefore more people are out buying boats and spending time on the water. All around the coastal United States and even potentially the world people target inshore fish. This need hasn’t been satisfied with a physical product yet most people will have their fishing partner keep an eye on the school for them. This works but what if the partner wants to catch a fish to or the water becomes dirty. I would say this opportunity is relatively big in the sense that not everyone in America fishes and then you have to divide that group into fresh and saltwater. Then split the group into inshore and offshore so it’s a pretty specified product. I believe this window of opportunity will not be open to much long because more and more people are getting out on the water and will soon realize this problem and come up with a similar solution.

Innovation: My Product the “schoolcator” Consists of three pieces a biodegradable colored float connected to biodegradable line which is tied to a biodegradable clamp. This product will come in three lengths 4ft 8ft and 12ft to better suit all bodies of water and fishermen. After catching a fish the schoolcator’s clamp can quickly and non-invasively be connect to the dorsal fin and then the fish can be released. After released the fish will swim back with his school and stay with his school the rest of the day allowing the angler to catch fish after fish. Due to saltwater extreme corrosive nature after about 12 hours the schoolcator will be almost completely dissolved. These product will be sold in the 5- 10 dollar range online and at many large outdoor retailers and tackle shops. With the disoving nature of this product multiple unit will need to be purchased at a time. This product in bulk will be extremely cheap to make and package. On the back of the package will be instructions on how it works.

Venture Concept: This product will allow anglers whether families or guides to stay with a group of fish throughout the entire day. There is not a product on the market that has even the same purpose as this product. From talking with many people in the fishing business they were all extremely happy and also jealous that they didn’t think of this idea. I believe it will be a huge it hit in the inshore fishing world. A small group of people can easy put and package the product in an assembly line fashion. The low price will make it an easy decision for customers who are on the fence or simply haven’t heard of the product. It will be great accessary item for any tackle box.

Three Elements:

1. My secret sauce to this product is that it is the only product in its market. There is no competitors and with it being ecofriendly no opposition to this product. Even PETA (People Enjoying Tasty Animals) wouldn’t have an argument against the schoolcator.

2. Next in this venture is figuring out who my suppliers would be and the price that I would be paying them. Also spreading the news of this product would be another big step I would begin to start taking. Organizing a team to help put together and package my product will also be on the horizon.

3. Five years from now I would hope to be living a little more financially comfortable and have my product being advertised on every fishing show and having its own endcap at major retailers across the country.

Feedback:

I got a lot of positive feedback from my venture concept especially on its biodegradable feature. One person brought up that people may use it at nighttime which got me thinking. I feel like It would be fairly easy to make a night fishing design also. I also got feedback make sure I keep the price low to prevent people from making their own more invasive models.




This is roughly the same design but instead of the bait there will be a clip and no lead sinker.

28A My Exit

1)    Identify the exit strategy you plan to make.

 Do you intend to sell your business in the next 5 years for a large return? Do you intend to stay with the business for several decades and retire? Do you intend to protect the venture as a family business, and pass it down to your children? If my business is as big as I want it to be in the next five years then I will sell most of it to a larger company that can put their logo on it and sell it even better. I would still however like a certain percentage of the profit from year to year. I do not think my business has the ability to be an extremely successful item that is worth passing down multiple generations just because of its small target range.

2)    Why have you selected this particular exit strategy?

I believe any entrepreneur dreams their business will take off like the dude who invented silly bands (the rubber bands that are in different shapes) but in reality I do not think my business has that opportunity. If however my product soars and becomes a huge hit I may keep it in the family so they can benefit from it.

3)    How do you think your exit strategy has influenced the other decisions you've made in your concept?

I feel like it’s influenced how I perceive my growth intensions. From the beginning I just wanted to make this product for the hardworking fisherman that spends a lot of time on the water keeping up with fish. I do not think my product will go international or even out of the southeastern United States.

27A Reflection #3

The Art of Social Media: Power Tips for Power Users, Guy Kawasaki

1) Theme:

-The overall theme of this book was how social media pretty much can make or break a business in today’s world. Ratings and reviews are everywhere today and it only takes one angry customers to reunion a business. It also only takes one happy customer to help a business succeed.

2) Connection with Class

- I think it connects on two different ways firstly it re-illustrates that the customer is number 1. No matter how much you love your product if the customer doesn’t you’re out of luck. Secondly it shows how important advertising and how your business appears on social media is.

3) Exercise for this class

-I think a good exercise would be to strictly use twitter or Facebook and find a restaurant or store that you’ve never been too and read all the reviews both good and bad. After reading the reviews write your opinion of the place then go to the place and experience it. Afterwards write another opinion and see how they compare.   

4) My 'aha' moment from reading the book?

-Working in retail I didn’t really have an ‘aha’ moment because every day we are told the customer is number 1. Do everything possible to please the customer because they will go on social media and write their experience. Usually only the people that have a bad experience will post their opinion so make everyone happy.

26A Failure

For the life of me no matter how many times I try, I have not been able to master the infamous “Texas Turn”. The Texas turn enables you to get your boat to plane off in shallow water without hitting the bottom and messing up your engine. When fishing super shallow water and wanting  to move to a different spot you can either idle all the way to deeper water which could be a mile in order to go fast or do a Texas turn in the shallow water to jump up on plane and go to your new spot. To do a Texas turn you must punch the throttle while doing a sharp turn to either the left or right then re correct and go straight all within a second or two. Doing this forces more water under the boat picking it up so you don’t hit the bottom. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried to master this but I always end up bogging down in the sand. Therefore I haven’t been brave enough to do it over hard bottom some people it takes years to master and some people just have a feel for it and can get it in a couple of try’s. Like the quote from Thomas Edison I have learned hundreds of ways not to do a Texas turn but unlike him I haven’t figured out the right way yet. I have not suffered emotionally or behaviorally from not being able to do this but it’s definitely made me make a goal of accomplishing this task. This class has replanted the concept of its good to fail because you can build and learn from your mistakes. I will definitely keep attempting it and not giving up on it because it is extremely useful to master.

25A Whats Next

Existing Market. 

Step 1: The first thing I have to do is get a list of suppliers for the pieces of my product. With the product being biodegradable finding a company may be a little more challenging. Second I need to find the most efficient yet beneficial marketing pathway to get the sales rolling.

Step 2: I interviewed three people who are in the same sort of family as my product (lure business) and they agreed with my first step of trying to nail down suppliers. They also said to start figuring out who will be working for you.

Step 3: In the first year of my product I hope to have several hundred units ready for sale. I hope to also be on several websites and have a shelf in most of the local tackle shops within a 100 miles of my headquarters. Also a group of about 5 people to help assemble and distribute my product to these stores and online customers.

Year 5 I hope for my product to be in the entire southeast United States including several large retailers like Bass Pro shops and Dicks sporting goods. I hope to be seeing some good money coming in and a lot and even more product going out. Hopefully I will have several sponsored pros who will help spread my product across the tournament trail. Five years is as far as I will look forward because I feel like it is a good spot to stop and see where I am at that time and fix any issue then look onward to another five years.

New Market.

Step 1: I believe this product could in the future impact the freshwater world of bass fishing also. Some design modifications would have to be made to account for the deeper average depth also the fact that freshwater doesn’t really corrode anything. This would however exponentially increase my sales if I can figure out how to make it work. The world of bass fishing is way bigger and more spread out than the world of saltwater fishing.

Step 2: Bass a really good schooling fish, they will school when it’s hot, cold, eating and spawning. They also tend to relate to small pieces of structure which makes them harder to find if in deeper water. Also lakes tend to be much dirtier than saltwater so sight fishing is almost impossible. This freshwater rig will help anglers stay with these schooling bass even in open water.

Step 3: Both of my interviews said my biggest challenge will be to get it approved by B.A.S.S which runs most of the big tournaments. They will ban items that give an unfair edge to certain participants. My product has the threat according to the people I interviewed to create an unfair advantage. This could potentially be devasting for my product because anglers wouldn’t use it if they cannot use it for the tournament.

Step 4: The biggest thing I learned if I were to enter this market is I have a lot of work cut out for me. I would have to complete redesign the product which may require new materials and work on getting it approved for the tournaments.

24A Venture Concept The Schoolcator

The Schoolcator

Opportunity: My potential customers are everyone no matter their age or ability who fishes inshore waters. These anglers know how it feels to do their homework and put their time in to locate then instantly lose track of a school of fish. The economy is on the rise and therefore more people are out buying boats and spending time on the water. All around the coastal United States and even potentially the world people target inshore fish. This need hasn’t been satisfied with a physical product yet most people will have their fishing partner keep an eye on the school for them. This works but what if the partner wants to catch a fish to or the water becomes dirty. I would say this opportunity is relatively big in the sense that not everyone in America fishes and then you have to divide that group into fresh and saltwater. Then split the group into inshore and offshore so it’s a pretty specified product. I believe this window of opportunity will not be open to much long because more and more people are getting out on the water and will soon realize this problem and come up with a similar solution.

Innovation: My Product the “schoolcator” Consists of three pieces a biodegradable colored float connected to biodegradable line which is tied to a biodegradable clamp. This product will come in three lengths 4ft 8ft and 12ft to better suit all bodies of water and fishermen. After catching a fish the schoolcator’s clamp can quickly and non-invasively be connect to the dorsal fin and then the fish can be released. After released the fish will swim back with his school and stay with his school the rest of the day allowing the angler to catch fish after fish. Due to saltwater extreme corrosive nature after about 12 hours the schoolcator will be almost completely dissolved. These product will be sold in the 5- 10 dollar range online and at many large outdoor retailers and tackle shops. With the disoving nature of this product multiple unit will need to be purchased at a time. This product in bulk will be extremely cheap to make and package. On the back of the package will be instructions on how it works.

Venture Concept: This product will allow anglers whether families or guides to stay with a group of fish throughout the entire day. There is not a product on the market that has even the same purpose as this product. From talking with many people in the fishing business they were all extremely happy and also jealous that they didn’t think of this idea. I believe it will be a huge it hit in the inshore fishing world. A small group of people can easy put and package the product in an assembly line fashion. The low price will make it an easy decision for customers who are on the fence or simply haven’t heard of the product. It will be great accessary item for any tackle box.

Three Elements:

1. My secret sauce to this product is that it is the only product in its market. There is no competitors and with it being ecofriendly no opposition to this product. Even PETA (People Enjoying Tasty Animals) wouldn’t have an argument against the schoolcator.

2. Next in this venture is figuring out who my suppliers would be and the price that I would be paying them. Also spreading the news of this product would be another big step I would begin to start taking. Organizing a team to help put together and package my product will also be on the horizon.

3. Five years from now I would hope to be living a little more financially comfortable and have my product being advertised on every fishing show and having its own endcap at major retailers across the country.