TIG Brands

  We Invite the Fire Drills The scene that comes to mind is from Kindergarten Cop. The fire alarm goes off, and John Kimble (Arnold Schwarzenegger) attempts to shepherd the kindergartners out of his classroom. In doing so, complete bedlam erupts. Why is it that entrepreneurship and chaos appear to be synonymous? Does it have to be that way? I don’t think it does. We invite our fire drills due to a lack of structure and rigor. I get it. For many of us, it was our opposition to structure and rigor that brought us to entrepreneurship. However, the chaos we face day in and day out is a signal that we’ve let the pendulum swing too far in the other direction. We don’t have to give up the freedom in trade for the drudgery of rigidity. There can be a balance. I write this article as we embark on an ... Business 2 Community had 1.11 million visits in January, 2021. See the full article here: https://www.business2community.com/leadership/we-invite-the-fire-drills-02388312

INFRA and NCG Outlook Presented by Pat Sheridan, Interim President & CEO, INFRA and Ben Nauman, Sr. Director of Purchasing, National Co+Op Grocers Moderated by Elliot Begoun LINK:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAFTLYmwGP0

  Should brands adjust their products to appeal to a larger consumer base? I had a recent conversation with the co-founders of a brand. They were struggling with a tricky question. They were getting some product feedback from investors, industry insiders, and consumers. It caused them to pause and ask if they should change the taste profile by adding some ingredients, even if it pulled them away from their core consumer. It’s a great question to ask and a hard one to answer. It allowed me to walk them through the Tardigrade Circle Theory, which I believe, for an emerging brand, is at the heart of a capital-efficient go-to-market strategy. I will use the above conversation to illustrate this theory walking you through an exercise that I hope proves helpful. I will anonymize it a bit to protect the innocent. If you want to play along at home, grab a blank piece of paper. The above brand’s core consumers are whole food plant-exclusive eaters. In other words, people eating a healthy ve...

Tardigrade Circle Theory I had a recent conversation with the co-founders of a brand. They were struggling with a tricky question. They were getting some product feedback from investors, industry insiders, and consumers. It caused them to pause and ask if they should change the taste profile by adding some ingredients, even if it pulled them away from their core consumer. It’s a great question to ask and a hard one to answer. It allowed me to walk them through the Tardigrade Circle Theory, which I believe, for an emerging brand, is at the heart of a capital-efficient go-to-market strategy. I will use the above conversation to illustrate this theory walking you through an exercise that I hope proves helpful. I will anonymize it a bit to protect the innocent. If you want to play along at home, grab a blank piece of paper. The above brand’s core consumers are whole food plant-exclusive eaters. In other words, people eating a healthy vegan diet. Those playing along at home, draw a small ci...

Every Statistic Has a Who 38% of Americans consider themselves flexitarian. 36.5% of Americans are clinically obese. 93% of people believe breakfast is essential, but 66% of them skip it. Let’s face it, we all love stats. They adorn our pitch decks and retailer presentations. We cite them when we want to appear smarter and more knowledgeable. We use them as part of our go-to-market narrative. What if we’ve been using statistics in the wrong way? Could we leverage them so that they deepen our understanding and increase their narrative impact? Yes, because behind every statistic is a person. By relegating that person to a data point or a number on a pitch deck, we miss the power of their story. We aggregate individuals into statistics and, in the process, anonymize and dehumanize them. That doesn’t make our story more compelling or help us better understand our consumers. Maybe we should try a different approach. Kate looks up from her phone in quiet reflection. She just finished reading...

Don't just use stats—build a story around them Thirty-eight percent of Americans consider themselves flexitarian. Thirty-six percent of Americans are clinically obese. Ninety-three percent of people believe breakfast is essential, but 66% of them skip it. Let’s face it, we all love stats. They adorn our pitch decks and retailer presentations. We cite them when we want to appear smarter and more knowledgeable. We use them as part of our go-to-market narrative. What if we’ve been using statistics in the wrong way? Could we leverage them so that they deepen our understanding and increase their narrative impact? Yes, because behind every statistic is a person. By relegating that person to a data point or a number on a pitch deck, we miss the power of their story. We aggregate individuals into statistics and, in the process, anonymize and dehumanize them. That doesn’t make our story more compelling or help us to better understand our consumers. Maybe we should try a different approach.....