Love your business, not your product

My grandmothers pickles were...

DeliciousAuthenticHandmadeLoved by my friendsLoved by many customersAnd most of all... utterly loved by me!

However my grandmother's pickles were also...

Not scalableToo seasonalLabour intensiveExtremely premiumGetting cost expensiveNot attracting enough repeat customers It still hurts to write this last bit - why? Because I grew up eating these pickles and chutneys and to think that they ever failed, feels like I failed the generations of women in my family who perfected these recipes over their lifetimes.Because I remember the days my little children, husband and I would sacrifice our weekends to carry boxes and boxes of these heavy pickles to every market in West London in the hope of making that £100- £150 sales.Truth be told, I really carried these condiments with me - not just physically but emotionally, generationally and dutifully - Because somewhere I felt that self imposed overwhelming pressure to make these family recipes a success!Because I knew how good the product was and was (arrogantly!?) determined to make them work.  Because if they represented true regional Indian cuisine, no one should ever need to eat a Pathaks or Sherwoods again!Well I can only look back at those days and realise how blinded I was with my love for these pickles that I completely ignored every sign that commercially indicated they were not presenting a scalable business opportunity.

A picture says a thousand words...

It is true that I shunned the pickles almost a year ago and focused on my savoury sprinkles for the foodservice industry - everything that the pickles were not, these sprinkles are - scalable, commercially viable and desirable by chefs across the country. 

Even as I was rebuilding Cheeky Food, I carried the grief of abandoning the pickles - a grief that would pop it's painful head at the most unexpected of times. In spite of building anew, I could never reason WHY the pickles had failed? Or what it was that I could have done differently.I only ever realised my folly when I came across this image in The Lean Startup by Eric Ries -

This was quite a profound realisation for me. In one simple image, I could stare into the last 6 years of mistakes that I made and why I made them.I was so blindly in love with my product that I ignored my vision with Cheeky Food. If only I had focused on my vision - bringing authentic regional Indian recipes to the UK retail market, I would have had the humility to recognise that the data was never in favour of my beloved grandmothers beloved pickles. I could have optimised to other products (meal kits, ready meals) or pivoted to another strategy (cookbook, vlogs) to bring that vision to life.

Instead I let my love for my product lead me for 6 years down a path of frustration, rejection and an uphill climb that led to nowhere.

Moving ahead...

 Today, as I rebuild Cheeky Food in the foodservice industry, I constantly remind myself of my vision - Building a trustable brand in the foodservice offering good food, naughty flavours. 

Detaching myself from my products (savoury sprinkles) is such a weight off my shoulders.

I don't feel obliged to make them work! I only feel obliged to build a brand in foodservice providing nutritionally good and tasty food that my customers want and are willing to pay for.

Even now, so much of our NPD that I get most enthusiastic about receives zilch commercial success. On the other hand some of our 30 min whims and fancies in the development kitchen lead to tonnes of annual sales. 

The trick is to experiment, validate and pivot/preserve -> All of this can be achieved with changing product, customer base, route to market or business strategy -> essentially the top tip and sometimes the middle part of the triangle above. 

This is what Cheeky Food Vision looks like now - 

The first thing I change is Products - This could mean newer/different flavours of savoury sprinkles and if data indicates then even moving to new categories like sauces, cooking oils, plant proteins etc.In Foodservice, I do this on a monthly basis, in Retail this can be done quarterly.I would also focus on pivoting the Strategy of the business (but not as frequently as Products)-Current RTM is restaurants and manufacturers, but if data indicates, we I could move to travel sector, meal kits or even manufacturing. In Foodservice, I would roughly do this once in 2 years, in Retail this can be done twice in a year (like changing DTC marketing to TikTok, digital ads etc).Note that the above two changes will still be coherent to my overall business vision of creating a brand within Foodservice that makes Good Food Naughty Flavours.

It is only when I have exhausted all versions of products and strategy and still not achieved my vision (Ouch) will I ever decide that it's time to pack shop and move onto pastures new. 

I recommend founders to create some version of this image, and keep handy for regular reference. It is good to have a list of potential product and strategy pivots available to your business vision, to know that once that list is exhausted, it is time to move on. 

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Next week  -

Motivation and/vs Discipline

Last Week - 

Why Selfridges wasn't the ideal first stockist for my Indian condiments -