Espresso: PerfectTed's 3 Proven Hacks to Create REAL Innovation

0:06And I also think there's another, I normally have a notepad, but I want to say this before I forget because I think there are a couple of things that I think hopefully listeners will get value out of is one, I think there's a difference between real innovation and fake innovation. Fake innovation is doing something different that no one cares about or that people won't pay a premium for if you're charging. If you're creating a more premium product that offers a slight difference in benefit. So for example, for us, if there's something else in the market that delivers on the functionality that we were going after, then what we were creating wouldn't have been truly different.

0:39And I think there are a lot of challenger brands that are like, we've, for example, if I took peanut butter, I don't really know peanut butter well. But imagine there was Manilife that was no added sugars, all natural, just peanuts. I'm going to screw the pitch, whatever. And then, but they were using peanuts from the, I'm going to absolutely just kill this. But where do peanuts come from? I mean, multiple places. China, we had ours from Argentina. Okay, cool. and they were like you know what i only want to use peanuts that are homegrown homegrown or single origin or pooped out the bum of a monkey yeah that's great that you can then charge a premium and maybe that's innovation because it's a different kind of peanut but the consumers really care um and so for us as we think about product development and as your brand listening and hearing our journey the way that we think about bringing a product to market is is there real innovation there because i think it's really hard to get a buyer's attention if there isn't true innovation is that give me another example of fake you don't have to say the brand names but fake innovation versus real innovation because i find that i think it's oh i love doing this you strike on gold i think we've hit gold yeah but what yeah give me more in sure a great example for us is when we first created the product we were only using um fruit juices not from concentrate that and that was making the recipe so expensive that there was no way we would have been able to be in a tesco meal deal and what we quickly realize is okay we will have to compromise here and we'll have to use fruit juices not from concentrate but if our goal is to get healthy energy in the hands of as many people as possible we need to be in a tesco meal deal if that's where one in every eight pounds in uk retail goes through we need to play in that retailer and so if that means using fruit juices from concentrate and it turns out we did a consumer study consumers didn't really know the difference especially in a sparkling beverage they almost expected it to come from concentrate so you're actually paying more for an ingredient that no one cared about over engineering a product so fake innovation can also be over engineering you know if many life decide that they are going to only use jars from the uk great but if it increases the price of the product by a pound and people aren't wanting to pay that premium you know you're actually hurting what your original mission was which was to great to to get great tasting healthy peanut butter and so real real innovation links to the overall missions we were saying overall mission but also what consumers want don't try and tell consumers what they want ask them and if they don't want what you're trying to give them don't try and force it down their throats so I agree with you but I kind of will push back on that as well because I think with you guys which is such a good example is everyone in the UK said match was too niche I bet you got loads of that yeah million people you may have said that too yeah I think I may have said that I actually think you did say that Who did you say that to?

3:33To Niche Yeah I think you may have said that You said that You said that to someone and it got back to me Not in lack of me in my past Quick one guys Espresso's got a brand new sponsor Unleashed Unleashed is inventory management software That talks directly to your finance and econ software We use Unleashed daily at Ireland I bloody love it We've got our admin time in half saving approximately 30k a year why use it save money save headaches save stress get granular clarity on your margins no way your stock is don't miss availability look your favorite brands literally use unleashed as their backbone candy kittens tiny rebel trick always religiously look there's a link in the show notes please feel free to book a call with josh and his wonderful sales team at unleashed they're amazing even nothing comes of it and even better news you'll get your first month free if you reference hungry thank you i may have written about it my newsletter i think as it was it was i said match was too niche but but for us and and that's where the distinction is is match is the input the output or the benefit is not too niche energy energy is the number one functional benefit as to why people purchase food and beverage products the this is what i'm saying so i i said it was too niche yeah i think a lot of people thought it was too niche yeah what you said there is don't just create something and then give people what they want right right you've got it but then i think it's the whole thing of um henry ford of if people asked if you know it wasn't a car people have asked for a half faster horse whereas i think with energy drinks is people you know you have other brands who were um creating other versions of energy drinks but it wasn't matcha people until you guys came along i think in in rtd people thought matcha no do you see what i'm saying no i i i agree with that and i think one thing to go back for a second is even though we we had to pivot and put matcha into a different format the mission was always the same to bring that jitter crash-free anxiety-free energy to the public through by by means of matcha it's about the framing so if you think about an energy drink it's just the trojan horse for us delivering the benefit that matcha provides which which is longer lasting, chitter-free, crash-free energy.

5:49I think Rory Sutherland is probably, do you know Rory Sutherland? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's been doing it twice. Oh, on this podcast? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He talks a lot about creating perceived value. And I think it's amazing. Everything from Uber Maps to creating a, you know, putting a mirror in an elevator so people think that it's moving quicker than it really is to Red Bull tasting like medicine because people perceive that medicinal taste to actually have an impact from an energy perspective. So for us, it's like, how do we package this product in a way that is digestible for people? at the beginning you're totally right we were way too focused on the matcha messaging and people didn't get it but as soon as you tell people it's like oh it's like a healthy energy drink they're like okay great and how's it healthy well it uses matcha rather than synthetic caffeine and it delivers on a different type of energy than what you've previously experienced yeah i think i think with brands um i was talking about this with freya yesterday and with kombucha and how i think what founders and brand not founders but brands and categories can get so bogged down in the features that it takes someone a flight of imagination this is very rory sutherland to start pushing the benefits yeah what trip did so well i remember going to know back in you know the trade show nnp cbd was ironically that trade show was all green it was everyone it looked medicinal everyone said we've got 25 grams of this 25 grams of that it looked it looked like a chemistry lab right Trip came along They stole the queues From other categories Repackaged it In terms of perceived value They led with a benefit Obviously the name's Trip But Calm and Everyday Chaos People are buying Calm They've packaged it at Calm I think what you guys have done Is so interesting Playing with this It's like The matches were the features As you said So focused on that When you change it To the We're Energy And then you bring this energy alive It's like a cheat code And actually it's been Such a journey And I don't want it to think like, you know, in the middle of the night, I was like, oh, Eureka, like amazing.

7:40We should pivot. And actually, someone had told us this right when we first started. They were like, why are you focusing on input? Focus on the output. Focus on the output. You're an energy product. You're an energy product. That's what people want. And I hold my hands up. I think that having match a front and center was the reason we gained listings so quickly, because it was so clear to buyers what the innovation was. It was on the ingredient. And had we led with the healthy energy messaging initially, they would have been like oh well it's just like a natural energy drink no but having said that putting matcha front and center made the education piece with consumers that much more difficult so now that we've gained retail listings we very much are focusing on the energy messaging rather than the input messaging of matcha and um is it okay to drop a little bomb uh give you give your listeners some inside information um we are actually going to be kind of redesigning our can and uh launching a refined version in hopefully around fab amazing and this it'll look very much like this can it'll just have somewhat of a different messaging hierarchy as in different can or different packet packaging like brand slightly different messaging slightly different messaging and we're switching to a printed can and um and we're we're no longer going to be leading with the matcha message whilst matcha will still maintain a fixture on the front of pack we will be pushing harder on the healthy energy messaging when when people are um when you're in sort of like a whole foods or a planet organic it's a very different type of consumer than those that shop meal deal um drinks so planet organic customers will pick up a product they'll look at the ingredients they'll try to understand the benefits they'll try to understand why you created that product in a meal deal situation it's a split second decision and you know most people will already be reaching for that diet coke so unless you scream another reason as to why they should pick your product over a diet coke you're not going to win that customer thank you so so much for listening it honestly means the world to me i hope you enjoyed your morning coffee and go and have an amazing day let's be having ya if you want the fun episode it will be in the show notes a link will be in the show notes the full episode thank you so much please leave friends as well means the world to me