4A – Forming An Opportunity Belief

1. I have a feeling that an opportunity exists in the current problem of ground coffee losing its potency after being ground and packaged for retail.

2. The unmet need is the retention of ground coffee bean quality. People who have this need are people who like to drink quality coffee but do not want to spend the time to grind whole coffee beans before every brew. This need has always been around and people who buy ground coffee beans deals with this by hoping that the batch is relatively fresh. I’m 80% confident that this opportunity exists.

3.     The three prototypical customers I have identified are my father, my mother, and a roommate.

4. Reflect-- I talked to three potential customers who purchase ground coffee regarding my belief of this opportunity. The customers feel that this problem exists only when they purchase ground coffee instead of whole beans. Their solution currently is to purchase in small batches and avoid holding ground coffee for too long. I learned that they all recognize that buying ground coffee is like being in the middle ground between quality and convenience. One customer says that that grinding coffee before every drink is very bothersome in the morning. Another asserts that ground coffee is a much better alternative to buying instant coffee. One of the most surprising things I learned from talking to these three customers is that one of them prefers pre-ground coffee over freshly ground coffee for brewing. The reason for this preference is because a fresh ground coffee brew has too much of an aroma and intensity and she preferred a rather subtle taste to her drink.

5. Summary-- After reflecting, I find that my confidence in this opportunity has fallen. Although it is a problem to the three customers that pre-ground coffee loses its potency quickly, it does not pose enough of a nuisance to motivate them to seek change. They all recognize that by buying ground coffee, you give up quality for accessibility. After this exercise, I believe it is important for entrepreneurs to adapt opportunities based on consumer feedback. This helps entrepreneurs better identify problems that consumers want to fix than problems that they really do not have.