Category Archives: Strategy

Are Coca-Cola and Green Mountain Late to the Personalization Party?

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Are Coca-Cola and Green Mountain Late to the Personalization Party?Recently I came across an announcement that Coca-Cola is partnering with Green Mountain Coffee Roasters to sell Coke products as part of Green Mountain’s new home beverage system slated for a release later this year. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Green Mountain, they make the popular Keurig in-home single-serving coffee machine (which became a popular home and office item after Nespresso’s patents expired). Now they want to expand their in-home beverage machine product line to include cold beverages. What is not clear in the press release is which of Coke’s products will be available with this new beverage system.

Will it only be beverages like Minute Maid juices, Powerade, Vitaminwater and non-carbonated beverages in their portfolio?

Or will it include the Coca-Cola crown jewels – Coke, Diet Coke, Sprite, etc.?

The only thing that is mentioned is that the system will not contain a carbon dioxide cylinder that needs to be changed periodically (something the Sodastream system requires).

So, what is driving Coca Cola to pursue this $1.25 Billion investment in Green Mountain Coffee Roasters in search of innovation?

Well, there are many different reasons why companies seek to innovate.

In Level 1 of the Global Innovation Certification we refer to this as Innovation Intent, and I am currently recording the fifth video module from two full days of live certification training materials for the Level 1 Innovation Certification eLearning, and this video module happens to be about innovation intent.

Some of the reasons that companies look to innovate can of course include:

  1. An ambitious leader
  2. A changing regulatory environment
  3. A changing competitive environment
  4. A desire for new growth opportunities
  5. Faltering company financials (burning platform)
  6. A need for competitive response
  7. Requests from customers
  8. Recognized new supplier capabilities
  9. Demands from shareholders
  10. Requests from passionate employees
  11. INSERT YOUR REASON HERE

Coca Cola FreestyleSo what is going on here for Coca-Cola?

Well, competitor Sodastream recently splashed out $4 million for a Super Bowl advertisement (during a game that our local Seattle Seahawks won) and has been growing steadily (while still small compared to Coca-Cola). But it does have a market cap of $780 Million and a growing fan base. But, at the same time, Coca-Cola is investing $1.25 Billion for 10% of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters. Why are they investing more than $1 Billion in this interesting, but still comparatively small segment of the beverage business?

Is this a smokescreen move, announcing a product that may never see the light of day, in order to dent the growth of an emerging competitor?

Is it a competitive response, a hedge, with a me-too product in case the home soda bottling movement continues to grow?

Is it just a logical doubling down for Coca-Cola in a belief that the beverage personalization trend has not exhausted itself yet, and building upon the success of the Coca-Cola Freestyle and the groundwork that Sodastream has done to seed the market for Coke?

Or has Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, with its massive distribution channels (in comparison to Sodastream), brought Coca-Cola something that truly represents an innovation in the beverage system market versus the Sodastream offering that might result in people switching and both gaining back market share for Coke in their core markets, while also potentially representing an opportunity for some of their less successful brands to gain traction in a space where they don’t have competition from Pepsi?

This of course would be the more interesting of the strategic undertones, and the one in which Pepsi, not Sodastream should be the most worried.

Because after all, in the minds of Coca-Cola executives, it is Pepsi that they are always most worried about, not someone like Sodastream, and anything that allows them to potentially steal market share from Pepsi, makes them very happy indeed.

What are the motivations behind this move and partnership, which direction will all of it go, and is there any real innovation happening here?

And what will Pepsi do?

I guess we will have to wait and see.

Meanwhile, ask yourself what your innovation intent is, and…

Keep innovating!


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Changing Business Models Around

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Changing Business Models AroundSome business models and products have been around so long that we just take them for granted, while others concepts that are becoming new business models are so new that we’re not quite sure what to expect. It is probably easiest to explain what I mean and why this juxtaposition is important by looking at a few examples. Most of these examples involve challenging our orthodoxies.

1. Coffee Shops

In the typical coffee shop pretty much anywhere in the world, the business model works like this – you buy a coffee and it comes along with it the right to take up a place at any table in the café for as long as you want. So, coffee buys you time. An article I came across on NPR highlights an entrepreneur in Moscow that has opened a restaurant that loosely translates to the Clockface Café where instead of buying coffee and getting time, you instead buy time ($4/hr per person for the 1st hour and $2 an hour after that, up to a maximum of $12 after 5 hours) and get coffee for free. Ivan Meetin, the founder, plans to open his next café in London. Meanwhile I have heard of similar operations in Paris, and by now they can probably also be found elsewhere. So, in your business what do people get for free, and what do they pay for? And is there an opportunity to change around what you charge for?

2. Waste Disposal

In many businesses, and in the creation of most products, there is waste. And in most cases, businesses pay to have this waste removed from their premises. Or there may be waste that the customer has to pay to have removed. But this doesn’t always have to be the case.

KFC, McDonald’s, Burger King, etc. used to have to pay to have their used fryer oil picked up, but now thanks to the rise of biodiesel they may even make money from this waste product.

Chicken FeetChicken processors used to throw the feet away after processing a truckload of chickens, but after they discovered that chicken feet are a delicacy in several Asian countries, they stopped throwing them away and instead started exporting them. In fact, chicken feet sell for more per pound than chicken breasts in China.

Broken OREO’s used to have no value before Cookies ‘n’ Cream ice cream (and now Cookies ‘n’ Cream OREO’s) were discovered.

And finally, I came across an example of a bottle cap concept created by designers from the Lanzhou University of Technology in China, intended to give poor children access to building blocks for play, from what was previously thrown away.

Building Caps

3. Discounts for Data

Data security and privacy is becoming an increasingly hot topic, and in the past companies would either ask customers for their data and not give them anything for it, or just not ask for it. But now we are seeing some interesting models of companies asking customers for data and instead giving them something of value in exchange. For example, Urban Outfitters rewards users that respond to promotions inside their mobile app or to users that allow its app to connect to their Twitter or Instagram accounts with points that can be redeemed for sale previews, concert tickets, or early access to new pieces. What data do you want from your customers? What is it worth to you? How could this exchange be made engaging and not be seen as a purely financial transaction?

4. The Soft Drink Category is Saturated and Cold

Soft drinks… How many people out there think that the soft drink category is a blue ocean full of incredible opportunities for unbounded growth for established soft drink makers? Most people would say that this is a mature category and a tough place for companies, full of merciless competition. But yet, people continue to innovate and challenge this orthodoxy. Witness a couple of interesting new concepts.

Shericks ShakesBritain has always been a hotbed of innovation, and the country that brought us Pret a Manger and Innocent smoothies brings us this tasty treat. Mr. Sherick’s Shakes brings people a little bit of luxury to their day in the form of their high quality milkshakes.

Meanwhile in Japan, there is a growing trend manifesting in a wave of product launches in the soft drink category that are not cold, but instead hot. Witness this example of what has always been a cold drink, Ginger Ale, being brought into the Japanese market as a hot beverage by Coca Cola’s Canada Dry unit.

Canada Dry Hot Ginger AlePeople always love something new and different, even if it is something old that has disappeared from the market. This is why fashion runs in cycles, and in a mature category like soft drinks there is no reason why we shouldn’t keep these principles in mind and see if now is the time to bring something back, or to see if there is an orthodoxy that we shouldn’t now look at challenging to see if an opportunity might not be created.

Conclusion

Innovation transforms the useful seeds of invention into widely adopted solutions valued above every existing alternative. Value comes not just from physical invention, or business model innovation, but from psychological and emotional benefits as well and the creation of new psychological or emotional value can happen in any industry at any point in time, no matter how mature the category seems to be. We as humans are strange creatures and we simultaneously fight against change (and hold back innovation as a result) and embrace new things (or at least like to try them). So challenge your patterns of accepted thinking to look for opportunity and work to overcome your beliefs that everything that could be done has been done in your industry.

Keep innovating!


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Cookies ‘n’ Cream Oreos and Chicken Feet

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Cookies n Cream Oreos

Chicken FeetNow you might be asking yourself…

What do Cookies ‘n’ Cream Oreos and chicken feet have in common?

In short, both cookies ‘n’ cream and chicken feet involve valuable delicacies that that come from what people previously thought of as waste products from the production of something that was seen as more valuable.

In the United States chicken feet used to be thought of as something that (A) we don’t eat and (B) that American chicken ranchers used to throw away. But in Asia they are a delicacy in several countries, and according to Wikipedia chicken feet sell for more money per kilogram than the chicken breast (the part here in the United States that we think of as the most valuable).

Meanwhile, Cookies ‘n’ Cream ice cream and now Cookies ‘n’ Cream Oreos are now both great ways for Nabisco to take sub par Oreo cookie wafers that might otherwise be thrown away and instead turn them into a valuable product.

In the same way, old fryer oil from places like KFC and McDonald’s used to cost restaurants money to dispose of and now with the demand for BioDiesel, these restaurants can now instead sell their old oil to third parties instead of paying someone to take it away!

So, you have to ask yourself as part of your innovation efforts, are there any waste products or outputs that we don’t think of as valuable that could be turned into something else valuable or that might have value to someone else?


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UPDATE – iPhone 5S mCommerce and Retail Implications

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In my previous article on some of the potential implications of the iPhone 5S launch, I talked about how one of the things that wasn’t included in the iPhone 5S that I thought would be, was NFC technology (Near Field Communications).

Or at least I thought that Apple left it out…

That was until I came across this GigaOm article and this FastCoLabs article.

iBeacons mention on WWDC slide

But it turns out that while they left out NFC, they didn’t leave out near field communications technology. They have just implemented in a slightly different way – using iBeacons – Apple’s flavor of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) that actually achieves the same basic job as NFC, but in a much more elegant and capable way.

To give you a better idea of what this technology is capable of (in addition to mobile payments), I encourage you to check out the following video about Estimote Smart Beacons:

I truly believe that the kinds of things that will come out of the BLE technology built into the new iPhone 5S in combination with the new fingerprint authentication will represent a quantum leap in the value we extract from our smartphones in much the same way that the AppStore that came along a year after the launch of the original iPhone.

UPDATE - iPhone 5S mCommerce and Retail Implications

It will be interesting to see what develops around the iPhone 5S (and the Android and Windows 8 devices to respond) over the next twelve months.

Keep innovating!

Image credits: GigaOM


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Interview for Top 75 Disruptive Experts Series

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Interview for Top 75 Disruptive Experts SeriesAs part of Bill Jensen’s series of interviews with the Top 75 Disruptive Experts from around the globe, I had the opportunity to sit down with Bill and discuss several different questions about disruption in this video interview, including:

  1. Introduction
  2. My Favorite Disruptive Hero
  3. My Value Innovation Framework
  4. My Favorite Disruptive Change
  5. The Disruptive Change I Struggle With

Some of the key points I make in the video are importance of recognizing opportunities and seizing them, the impact of online services on how we all relate to each other and conduct our lives, my view on the key components to creating innovation success, and finally some thoughts on how evolving mobile capabilities are already changing our lives and how mobile will continue to change us (aka the mobile-centered human experience). Hope you enjoy it!

If you would like to schedule an interview with me for your online, television, print, or radio program, please contact me.


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Fingerprints of mCommerce Success on iPhone 5S?

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Fingerprints of mCommerce Success on iPhone 5SLast August I wrote about Apple’s pending acquisition of Authentec, a biometric authentication company (which has since closed). At the time Apple was in a real hurry to complete the acquisition and it made me wonder whether Authentec’s fingerprint authentication technology would make it into the home button of the iPhone 5 and eventually into the iPad and the iPad Mini. It didn’t.

But today, as part of the new iPhone 5S, Apple has finally integrated this biometric technology into their flagship mobile phone.

Why does this tiny little sensor represent such a potential sea change for the mobile industry?

Let’s look at all of the ways that this technology addition makes the iPhone more valuable than other phones.

1. Security and Personalization

By integrating the Authentec technology into the iPhone 5S home button, and eventually the iPad and the iPad Mini, Apple can not only create a handy way (no pun intended) to eliminate the need for remembering passwords, but also enable people to make their devices easily personalized for MULTIPLE users of the same device.

But if Apple takes advantage of all the purported abilities of the Authentec technology, the new iPhone 5S may also have the ability to recognize multiple fingers from a single individual, allowing for the home button to potentially achieve multiple functions – like the multiple button mouse.

In practical terms, this means for example that if your five-year-old gets a hold of your iPhone 5S, or you let them have it to keep them occupied in a restaurant, the iPhone 5S could potentially keep them from making phone calls, opening your work emails, etc. or just limit them just to accessing the Apps you grant them access to. But there is also no reason why apps like Netflix could also become personalized based on whose finger was used.

And maybe finally Apple will finally introduce some parental controls on the iPad. It’s maddening as a parent that my only choice on our iPad is to either give my daughter full access to Safari, or no access to Safari and that I have to go in and re-enable Safari when I want to use it. What decade is this? Hopefully iOS 7 will fix this.

2. iTunes and App Store Authentication

For Apple, there are also legal and financial benefits from adding fingerprint authentication, as it will help to prevent (or at least reduce) unauthorized iTunes purchases made by account hackers or children playing with their parent’s iPhone 5S (or upcoming iPad 5). Fingerprint authentication in iPhone 5S and iPad 5 may also encourage people to begin utilizing Apple’s Passport.

3. Universal mCommerce Authentication v1.0

It is embarrassing that the United States is so far behind the rest of the world when it comes to mCommerce. Mostly this has been because the financial services companies (Citibank, Bank of America, Chase, Wells Fargo, American Express, Mastercard, Visa, Verisign, etc.) and mobile phone carriers (Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, etc.) have been fighting to control mCommerce in the United States to the detriment of United States citizens and consumers and mobile innovation. Shame on you!

The new iPhone 5S might help to reignite mobile innovation and mCommerce activity in the United Sates. And given that Apple makes most of their money selling hardware and are facing a market share challenge from Android and Windows 8 devices, it is in Apple’s best interest to open up a fingerprint sensor API in iOS 7 for third party app developers to utilize. This would maximize the potential differentiation and hardware sales, and the incremental device lock-in offered by this new capability.

But there are also increased revenue opportunities for Apple, as integrated fingerprint authentication is likely to lead to an increase in impulse iTunes and App Store purchases. Why will a fingerprint sensor likely lead to an increase in music and app purchases for Apple? Simple, it will make it easier and faster for people to buy things from iTunes or the App Store, and give consumers less time to change their mind after they get the urge to buy something.

One thing I didn’t see mentioned in Apple’s iPhone 5S announcement was the inclusion of any kind of Near Field Communication (NFC) capability in this latest flagship model. So v1.0 of Apple’s universal mCommerce authentication capabilities may only include authentication of eCommerce purchases made via mobile web sites or mobile apps. Without NFC I’m not sure exactly how authenticated purchases in the physical world would be made, short of a scanner reading a post-authentication-generated QR Code or something like that. Of course there is a way (or several) and mobile innovators surely will find them until NFC is incorporated into future iPhones and iPads.


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4. Universal mCommerce Authentication v2.0

Once NFC capabilities are added to the iPhone, then people like Square, but also traditional banks, and even Google could add iPhone 5S fingerprint authentication to apps for mCommerce for users to download and install on their phone. This represents a HUGE opportunity for Square and a challenge obviously for the established players. It will be interesting to see whether Apple will be the first to integrate fingerprint authentication together with NFC or whether Samsung or someone else will beat them to it, or even whether it might be able to be added via a 3rd party case or backing for the phone. What do you think?

Wrapup

The initial iPhone turned your finger into a more useful tool for the digital world. The new iPhone 5S turns your finger into a key, and how many locks it will help you open remains to be seen. Let’s hope that in the same way that the iPhone broke the stranglehold that the mobile carriers had on application innovation on the handset, the new iPhone 5S will create a new wave of mobile innovation in the mCommerce space.

Let’s hope that Apple’s new iPhone 5S gives new meaning to the phrase ‘Digital Innovation’.

Okay this time the pun is intended, and hopefully it will help some of you think of new possibilities for digit-driven computing.

Keep innovating!

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Las Ocho I’s de la Innovación Infinita

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Las Ocho I’s de la Innovación Infinita

Gracias Vanessa López De la O para su traducción!

Algunos autores argumentan que la innovación exitosa es la suma de la idea más la ejecución; otros hablan más de la importancia de la intuición (insight) y su papel en impulsar la creación de ideas que será sustantiva para los consumidores; y unos cuantos se refieren al papel que la inspiración desempeña en desatar la intuición potencial. Mas la innovación está totalmente vinculada con el valor y cada una de las definiciones, marcos y modelos que existen, sólo cuentan una parte de la historia de la innovación exitosa.

Para alcanzar un éxito sostenible en la innovación, debes trabajar para incorporar un proceso y un modo de pensar reiterativos al interior de tu organización; y es por ello que es importante tener un lenguaje común y marco guía sencillos para la innovación infinita, que todos los empleados puedan comprender fácilmente. Si la innovación se vuelve muy compleja o parece muy difícil, entonces la gente ya no la buscará o no la apoyará.

Algunas organizaciones buscan alcanzar esta simplicidad, o hacer que la búsqueda de la innovación parezca más alcanzable, considerando a la innovación como una actividad impulsada con base en proyectos. Sin embargo, un enfoque por proyecto a la innovación no le permitirá jamás convertirse en un modo de vida en tu organización. En lugar de ello, debes trabajar para posicionar a la innovación como algo infinito, como un pilar de la organización; algo con su propia búsqueda de la excelencia – una práctica profesional con la cual se está comprometido.

Así pues, si tomamos bastantes de las buenas prácticas de excelencia en la innovación y las mezclamos con algunos pocos nuevos ingredientes, el resultado es un sencillo marco que las organizaciones pueden utilizar para guiar su búsqueda sostenible de innovación – las Ocho I’s de la Innovación Infinita. Este nuevo marco ancla lo que es un proceso muy colaborativo. Aquí está el marco y algunos de los muchos puntos que las organizaciones deben considerar durante cada etapa del proceso continuo:

1. Inspiración

  • Los empleados están navegando constantemente un mundo siempre cambiante, tanto en su contexto nacional, como en el que se encuentran si viajan por el mundo de negocios o placer, o incluso a través de varias páginas web en el navegador de su PC, tableta o teléfono inteligente.
  • A medida que se mueven por el mundo, ¿qué es lo que ven que los inspire y posiblemente también a los esfuerzos de innovación de la empresa?
  • ¿Qué perciben que la tecnología haga posible pronto, que no era posible antes?
  • La primera vez buscamos inspiración en torno a qué hacer; la segunda, buscamos inspirarnos acerca de cómo hacerlo.
  • En las ideas que fueron seleccionadas, ¿qué inspiración encontramos para su implementación, iluminación y/o instalación?

2. Investigación

  • ¿Qué podemos aprender de los diversos elementos de inspiración que los empleados generan?
  • ¿Cómo se reúnen y conectan los elementos aislados de inspiración? O ¿lo hacen?
  • ¿Qué percepciones intuitivas de los clientes se encuentran ocultas en estos elementos de inspiración?
  • ¿Qué tareas-por-hacer son las menos atendidas y en las que vale la pena profundizar?
  • ¿Qué necesidades no satisfechas de los clientes que identificamos vale la pena intentar resolver?
  • ¿Cuáles son las oportunidades más prometedoras, y cuáles podrían ser las más rentables?

3. Ideación

  • No queremos sólo generar montones de ideas, queremos generar montones de buenas ideas.
  • Las intuiciones y la inspiración de las primeras dos etapas incrementan la relevancia y la profundidad de las ideas.
  • Debemos de proveer a la gente de algún medio para compartir sus ideas, de una manera en que se sientan seguros.
  • ¿Cómo podemos integrar de la mejor manera posible los métodos de ideación, existentes tanto dentro como fuera de las comunicaciones virtuales (Internet)?
  • ¿Qué tan bien hemos comunicado los tipos de innovación que buscamos?
  • ¿Hemos capacitado a nuestros empleados en una diversidad de métodos creativos?

4. Iteración

  • Ninguna idea surge completamente formada, por lo que debemos darle a la gente una herramienta que les permita contribuir ideas de manera que los demás puedan basarse en ellas; y contribuir a descubrir las potenciales fallas fatales de las ideas, a fin de que puedan ser superadas.
  • Debemos hacer prototipos de las ideas y realizar experimentos para validar suposiciones, así como probar obstáculos potenciales o incertidumbres para obtener aprendizajes que podamos utilizar para fortalecer cada idea y su respectivo prototipo.
  • A medida que realizamos cada experimento, ¿estamos instrumentando para el aprendizaje?

Las Ocho I's de la Innovación Infinita

5. Identificación

  • ¿De qué maneras dificultamos a los clientes desatar el valor potencial de esta solución potencialmente innovadora?
  • ¿Cuáles son las mayores barreras potenciales para la adopción?
  • ¿Qué cambios necesitamos hacer desde una perspectiva financiera, mercadológica, de diseño o de ventas, para facilitar a los clientes el acceso al valor de esta nueva solución?
  • ¿En relación a qué ideas estamos mejor posicionados para desarrollar y llevar al mercado?
  • ¿De qué recursos carecemos para llevar a cabo la promesa de cada idea?
  • Con base en todos los experimentos, datos y mercados, ¿qué ideas deberíamos seleccionar?

Como podrás apreciar en el marco, antes de proceder a la implementación, las cosas vuelven al circuito a través de la inspiración nuevamente. Hay dos razones principales de por qué ocurre esto. La primera consiste en que si los empleados no están inspirados por las ideas que has elegido comercializar y/o por algunas de las cuestiones potenciales de implementación que has identificado, entonces o has elegido las ideas equivocadas o tienes a los empleados equivocados. La segunda razón es que en esta intersección podrías volver en el circuito a través de las primeras cinco etapas con una visión previsora de la implementación (antes de comenzar a implementar de hecho tus ideas), O podrías desatar mucha inspiración y aportes de una audiencia interna más amplia, para llevarlos a la fase de implementación.

6. Implementación

  • ¿Cuáles son los medios más efectivos y eficientes para hacer, comercializar y vender esta nueva solución?
  • ¿Qué tanto nos llevará desarrollar la solución?
  • ¿Tenemos acceso a los recursos que necesitaremos para producir la solución?
  • ¿Estamos fuertes en los canales de distribución que son más adecuados para concretar esta solución?

7. Iluminación

  • Para los clientes potenciales, ¿es obvia la necesidad de la solución?
  • ¿Estamos lanzando una nueva solución a una categoría existente de producto/servicio, o estamos creando una nueva categoría?
  • Esta nueva solución, ¿encaja dentro de nuestro paraguas de marca existente y representa algo que los clientes potenciales confiarían en nosotros al vendérsela?
  • ¿Qué tanta interpretación de valor necesitamos hacer para ayudar a entender a los clientes potenciales, cómo esta nueva solución encaja en sus vidas y debe tenerse?
  • ¿Necesitamos meramente explicar esta innovación potencial a los clientes porque se ancla a algo que ya entienden, o necesitamos educarlos en el valor que aportará a sus vidas?

8. Instalación

  • ¿Cómo hacemos de la mejor manera que esta nueva solución se convierta en una parte aceptada de la vida diaria de un gran número de personas?
  • ¿Cómo eliminamos las trabas de acceso para facilitarle lo más posible a la gente adoptar esta nueva solución, y que incluso la difundan entre sus amistades?
  • ¿Cómo instrumentamos para aprender durante el proceso de instalación, y así retroalimentar nuevas lecciones dadas por los clientes de vuelta al proceso para incorporar actualizaciones potenciales a la solución?

Conclusión

El marco de las Ocho I’s de la Innovación Infinita está diseñado para ser un proceso continuo de aprendizaje, uno sin fin, dado que los resultados de un ciclo se vuelven los aportes para el siguiente. Es asimismo, un marco guía relativamente nuevo para ser utilizado por las organizaciones, por lo cual si tienes ideas de cómo hacerlo aún mejor, por favor házmelas saber en los comentarios. El marco también es ideal para empoderar a una ola de nuevas transformaciones organizacionales por venir, conforme un número creciente de organizaciones (incluyendo Hallmark) comienzan a dejar una estructura organizacional centrada en el producto, por una centrada en las necesidades del cliente. El poder de este nuevo enfoque reside en que concentra a la organización en llevar a cabo las soluciones que los clientes requieren, a medida que sus necesidades continúan cambiando, en lugar de enfocarse tan solo en cómo hacer mejor un producto en particular (o un conjunto de productos).

En resumen, a medida que dejas el enfoque por proyecto que está evitando que la innovación se vuelva un modo de vida en tu organización, considera utilizar las Ocho I’s de la Innovación Infinita para influir en la mentalidad de tu organización y para anclar su lenguaje común de la innovación. El marco es estupendo para guiar conversaciones, hacer más fuertes tus resultados de la innovación, y contribuirá a tu búsqueda de la excelencia en la innovación –así que pruébalo.

Derechos Reservados 2013 – Braden Kelley

Traducción: Vanessa López De la O.

Vanessa Lopez-De la OVanessa López De la O es Co-Fundadora de Ecology of Innovation. Una experta en Desarrollo Internacional, también es la Embajadora de México en la Red Global por un Futuro Floreciente y Sostenible.

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Renting ‘Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire’

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I noticed something new on the Amazon page for my book Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire today when I popped onto their web site.

What was it?

Amazon has introduced a rental option for textbooks.

It makes sense that my book is part of the program because Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire is being used as a text book as part of innovation courses at Creighton and other fine institutions.

Professors can get evaluation copies here from my publisher John Wiley & Sons.

Here is a screenshot:

Rent 'Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire'

BUT, one thing that doesn’t make sense is that the rental price of $22.22 is only slightly less than the discounted sale price of $22.53 that Amazon charges for a new copy of my book. Which is a pretty good discount off the retail price of $34.95.

Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire makes a great bulk book buy for organizations seeking to establish a common language of innovation or to identify and remove one or more barriers to innovation they might be struggling against.

I believe in the content so much that I’ve made a downloadable free sample chapter available for everyone.

If you are in the United States and interested in making a bulk purchase of this five-star book, please contact Hooks Book Events – an independent minority women-owned business in Washington D.C.

If you are outside the United States, you might want to check out 800-CEO-Read or you can get FREE shipping to 90 countries is available from Book Depository.

And what better way to get the most value out of a bulk purchase of my book than to invite me to come deliver an innovation keynote or workshop? 🙂


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Philadelphia – Food Fail

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Kraft Philadelphia - Food FailIn a continuing series of articles exposing the gradual degradation of our food supply, I’d like to highlight what used to be called Philadelphia Cream Cheese, but now you will notice that the logo has dropped the cream cheese phrase from the logo.

Why is that you might ask?

Kraft Philadelphia - Food FailWell, Kraft might say because they are trying to extend the brand into new areas, but I would also say that, hopefully, legally now (or soon) they can no longer call it cream cheese because really it is no longer cream cheese, but is now instead is a cream cheese spread.

Cream cheese is technically cultured milk (you can use yogurt) that has been strained of its whey and you can even make it at home using whole milk yogurt.

If you look at the ingredients of most cream cheeses, or sour creams, or chocolate milk and possibly even some yogurts, you will notice that one of the ingredients will be carageenan or some kind of tree gum like xantham gum or locust bean gum. Some of these products even though they are no longer the food you might think they are, you will find might even be labeled “All Natural.”

You will notice that if you get a bagel and cream cheese at Starbucks that the packet they give you is labeled “cream cheese spread”.

At least Starbucks is honest about it that they are not really giving you real cream cheese, but you will notice again the presence of a qualifier word – “spread” – just like honey sauce from KFC.

And if you have any doubts in your mind whether cream cheese can or sour cream be made without these tree gums, check out the products from the Springfield Creamery sold under the Nancy’s brand on the west coast:

– Nancy’s All Natural Sour Cream
– Nancy’s All Natural Cream Cheese

So, Kraft and Starbucks and others are unfortunately responsible for providing another terrible example of cost cutting gone mad, degrading our food supply again as a result.

What is your favorite food fail story?

Stay tuned for more high profile food fails…


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Kentucky ‘Fraud’ Chicken – Food Fail

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Kentucky Fraud Chicken - Food FailCost Cutting Gone Mad

Every time I turn around, food continues to get less and less real.

Imagine my surprise when in a fit of weakness I turned up at my local KFC (yes, the word chicken is no longer in the name) and they simultaneously handed me honey sauce that is only 7% honey and told me that they were going to soon be offering chickens without bones as an option.

How can a chicken walk around without bones? 😉

Needless to say, that was my last visit to KFC unless I get stranded in an airport somewhere with no other option.

Is the unending quest for corporate profits in the food industry and our own quest for convenience killing us?

I’ll let you draw your own conclusions, but there is no doubt that chain restaurant food is getting less and less real and this is just the latest example of a company crossing the line of decency (in my opinion) in pursuit of profits.

What is your favorite food fail story?

NOTE: While not technically fraud, I bet that if you surveyed 100 people after they consumed honey sauce, that probably 80% of the people would tell you that they just ate honey, not corn syrup with a taste of honey. For what it’s worth.

Stay tuned for more high profile food fails…

P.S. Thanks to Glenn for turning me on to some Far Side humor to the boneless chicken issue.

Boneless Chicken Ranch

Image credit: Gary Larson, Just-Ask-Jill.com


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