Tip To Entrepreneurs

Would-be entrepreneurs sometimes fall into the trap of being too close to their idea to see it objectively, and wrongly assume that everyone’s as enthusiastic about it as they are themselves.  This seems to be a wonderful case in point: “Sally the Salad Robot,” a vending machine that dispenses salad ingredients (including pieces of chicken!) as if they were candy bars or sodas. 

The only way around a potential catastrophe in a case like this is original market research.  Go ask 100 or so people in the demographics you wish to target what they think of the idea, how/when/if they would use it, and what improvements they might suggest.  Make sure they don’t have the same reaction I did, i.e., repulsion.  In my mind, salad = fresh and healthy, and machine food = stale and semi-poisonous.  Machine food that includes chicken = potentially lethally poisonous.  Could I be the only one who feels that way?  Of course.  But I doubt it.

In case it needs to be said, shooting down an idea at the concept stage is many hundreds of times less expensive (and embarrassing) than having it fail in the marketplace.