Overcoming an Existential Threat
Food & Beverages
Case Background
Even the world’s largest brands can’t ignore the harsh reality of shifting consumption patterns. Our Client – a leading global beverage company – recognized that their flagship product was losing relevance as consumer preferences were trending away not only from their brand portfolio but from the entire category. Despite a significant amount of time and very substantial resources dedicated to addressing this existential threat, none of the present or previous initiatives managed to produce a sufficient positive impact for our Client. The gravity of this situation called for immediate action led by the senior team looking to turn a growing health stigma about core products into a business advantage.
Photo by Katherine Sousa on Unsplash
Our team applied Phases 1 & 2 of the Precedent Driven Innovation methodology to inject breakthrough ideas into an existing strategy. In the FRAME phase, we diagramed the key issues of the existential threat by capturing perspectives at multiple levels in the organization across four countries. Next, we pressure-tested each key issue with our vetting framework to fully understand each issue and prove its criticality. Each issue was assessed from every angle, setting the stage for prioritization which was accomplished by reaching group consensus among leadership across three KPIs: size of the prize; business impact, and degree of difficulty. During the CREATE phase, we looked across industries to find anyone, anywhere who had solved elements of the launch challenge. Disassociating each element from a company-specific context led to the broadest possible search for winning launch ideas that resulted in hundreds of precedents identified and analyzed. The most promising precedents were grouped into four winning themes and shared with the Client team: Visible Leadership, Controlling Perception, Flip the Conversation, and People Wanting to Be Part of the Solution. 6 big ideas emerged from the RECOMBINATION Workshop building on the insights from strongest precedents that resonated with the Client team. Each idea satisfied a range of pre-established criteria and was supplemented by an outline of the implementation plan.
Our Approach
We helped our Client develop breakthrough ideas that helped leverage significant assets and turned one of the most pressing business threats into a sustained competitive advantage. Eventually, the portfolio of innovative solutions and strategies crafted and introduced by our Client on a regional and country scale addressed the root causes of a complex web of interconnected issues that ranged from regulatory complications to the problem of obesity perception by the consumers and the members of the public.
Output
Overcoming an Existential Threat
Food & Beverages
Case Background
Even the world’s largest brands can’t ignore the harsh reality of shifting consumption patterns. Our client – a leading global beverage company – recognized that their flagship product was losing relevance as consumer preferences were trending away not only from their brand portfolio but from the entire category. Despite a significant amount of time and very substantial resources dedicated to addressing this existential threat, none of the present or previous initiatives managed to produce a sufficient positive impact for our client. The gravity of this situation called for immediate action led by the senior team looking to turn a growing health stigma about core products into a business advantage.
Photo by Katherine Sousa on Unsplash
Our team applied Phases 1 & 2 of the Precedent Driven Innovation methodology to inject breakthrough ideas into an existing strategy. In the FRAME phase, we diagramed the key issues of the existential threat by capturing perspectives at multiple levels in the organization across four countries. Next, we pressure-tested each key issue with our vetting framework to fully understand each issue and prove its criticality. Each issue was assessed from every angle, setting the stage for prioritization which was accomplished by reaching group consensus among leadership across three KPIs: size of the prize; business impact, and degree of difficulty. During the CREATE phase, we looked across industries to find anyone, anywhere who had solved elements of the launch challenge. Disassociating each element from a company-specific context led to the broadest possible search for winning launch ideas that resulted in hundreds of precedents identified and analyzed. The most promising precedents were grouped into four winning themes and shared with the client team: Visible Leadership, Controlling Perception, Flip the Conversation, and People Wanting to Be Part of the Solution. 6 big ideas emerged from the RECOMBINATION Workshop building on the insights from strongest precedents that resonated with the client team. Each idea satisfied a range of pre-established criteria and was supplemented by an outline of the implementation plan.
Our Approach
We helped our client develop breakthrough ideas that helped leverage significant assets and turned one of the most pressing business threats into a sustained competitive advantage. Eventually, the portfolio of innovative solutions and strategies crafted and introduced by our client on a regional and country scale addressed the root causes of a complex web of interconnected issues that ranged from regulatory complications to the problem of obesity perception by the consumers and the members of the public.