Creating Blue Oceans

Defying Conventional Wisdom: Meat with exercise?

Blue Ocean Strategy is all about challenging conventional wisdom – questioning taken-for-granted assumptions, and overstepping industry boundaries. It’s a frame of mind of continuously questioning and searching for a different angle and fresh perspective. You can draw inspiration from everyday life, and train your mind by having a discerning view of the world around you. Consider the following bit of comic insight as example of challenging conventional wisdom.

The increasing demand for free-range animal meat is admirable. It shows that people are concerned and compassionate about the amount of exercise animals get prior to being eaten. But is it enough to simply know that a cow or chicken is free-range or not? This label only indicates whether an animal had access to exercise, but doesn’t show to what extent it took advantage of it. So shouldn’t the general temperament of the animal (i.e. lazy, lackluster, frisky or hyper) also be indicated on each package of free-range meat, so as to allow consumers to get the full picture?

[Image via Cobham Farmers Market.]

All revved-up, Blue Ocean style

We’ve covered previously Blue Ocean Strategy-like models of inspiration from the auto industry, such as Koenigsegg and Tesla.  And it seems that the latest entrant, Local Motors, is also set to defy the conventional wisdom of the auto industry. Enter John B. Rogers, the CEO of Local Motors, who is “trying to rethink, rather than overtake, the traditional auto industry.”  His vision: To challenge the paradigm of highly centralized manufacturing, embattled dealerships, and dispersed service locations in order to produce newer, safer, more exciting, more efficient cars bought and serviced in a more pleasurable local experience. 

From BusinessWeek:

I realized it was possible to run an environmentally focused car company in different ways," he says. Most of today's auto entrepreneurs, such as Tesla Motors and A Better Place, focus on alternative fuel sources. But Rogers looked at another way of building a sustainable car business. He imagined he could produce vehicles locally and on demand at "micro-factories," where buyers could watch and even participate in making the car. This would eliminate wasting resources on mass-producing and shipping cars that might sit unbought on a car dealer's lot. More than that, he wanted to source "dream car" concepts direct from potential buyers, rather than to dictate designs, as the major automakers do.

[Image via Boston.com .]

The courage to lead

If you haven’t already stopped by Beyond Business, the companion blog to the newly published book Radical Action for Radical Times, you should definitely click on over to read Jonathan Hornby’s latest entry entitled “The courage to lead.”  In his article, Jonathan questions why we continue to do things just because they have always been done a certain way — for example they’ve been handed down from generation to generation — yet few stop to question if the process is still the most efficient, or if it adds value.  And, echoing what Gabor has said previously, Jonathan points out that recessions or negative events are the best time to innovate and to radically rethink how business is done.

From Jonathan Hornby’s Beyond Business:

During the good times, following may be a wise move — you can learn from others mistakes. But as Carl Schramm noted in my book, recessions are where we make economies stronger coming out of the cycle. And when that uptick happens — it happens fast.

If you haven’t made the investments, if you aren’t “leading,” you may never catch up. Gabor George Burt would say this is a perfect “Blue Ocean Strategy” — these companies are pursuing a differentiated strategy (pursuing environmental issues) while reducing their cost to operate.

[Image via bratan.]

Let’s get academic — Reader Responses

In the September issue of Fast Company, Editor Robert Safian posed challenging questions about the state of higher education, and the best model for the future.  Gabor’s proposed solution — printed in the November issue of Fast Company — would see universities using a portion of their endownment income to do away with tuition all together, and offer free attendance.  His idea generated a flurry of supportive responses, the most dynamic of which we will share with our readers. 

From Brian Lynch of Lynchpyns:

Just read your letter in the Nov 9 Fast Co issue - very salient points! I think your idea is one with a future - it's something we're discussing with post secondary schools now. We're a start-up web service for students, taking everything they need for learning content and putting it on-line - no more textbooks. It's about making the students (the customer) the priority. Education, economics and the environment - all done better. One of the initiatives we're pressing for is a freshman on-line lottery where the schools that use our service select one freshman in the first semester to receive a four-year scholarship.

Great letter!

Best regards,
Brian

Do you have a Blue Ocean Strategy-like solution for higher education — or perhaps one which Defies Conventional Wisdom?  If so, you can share it with us via the ‘email me’ link above.

[Image via Signal Rock Communications.]

Defying Conventional Wisdom: Sniff this Camembert!

Blue Ocean Strategy is all about challenging conventional wisdom — questioning taken-for-granted assumptions, and overstepping industry boundaries. It’s a frame of mind of continuously questioning and searching for a different angle and fresh perspective. You can draw inspiration from everyday life, and train your mind by having a discerning view of the world around you. Consider the following bit of comic insight as example of challenging conventional wisdom.

Fashion magazines ought to feature peel-off sniff ads not only for perfumes, but for cheeses as well. In fact the two should be indistinguishable from the outside, so that adventurous readers would discover the nature of the advertisement only during each sniff. This would make for a much more suspenseful olfactory experience, not knowing in advance whether you are about to succumb to the magical scent of an exotic perfume or a small chunk of well-ripened Camembert.

[Image via Indigo Guide.]

Is the fashion industry going out of style?

“There’s no such thing as a permanently great company or a permanently great industry. All industries rise and fall as do companies.  However, there are permanently smart strategic moves” — W. Chan Kim & Renée Mauborgne, from Chief Executive magazine article “Flouting Conventional Wisdom” (May 2003).

A key quality industries and companies should strive for is adaptability, always scanning and acting upon broad market opportunities. All industries and companies face difficult or life-threatening challenges at one point or another, and it is their adaptability and ability to make smart strategic moves which allow them to prosper even in the face of adversity.

It seems that one of the latest industries which may be going out of style is fashion and retail.  From the LA Times:

"Between new technology and the economy, the fashion industry will never be the same," New York designer Norma Kamali said. "It makes you stand back and say, 'If I continue doing what I'm doing, I may not stay in business.' It's time to rethink and look at what's working and what's not."

....The global strategy of branding and merchandising that has dominated the luxury sector for the last decade is falling away in favor of more authentic, localized experiences. Luxury brands are borrowing ideas from the fast-fashion world -- opening pop-up shops, launching limited-edition collections, even mixing it up with the mass market.

Shoppers are "accustomed to having new styles in the stores all the time, and this is forcing luxury brands to be more similar to Zara and H&M in the way they emphasize newness, entertainment and the in-store experience," said Claudia D'Arpizio, a business consultant for market research firm Bain & Co.

"The retail industry has gotten lackadaisical," said Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst for Port Washington, N.Y.-based market research firm NPD Group. "It went through eight years of uninterrupted growth, where you could just stick it on the floor and it would sell because the customer wasn't thinking about what they were spending money on. But the rules have changed, and you have to earn your stripes again. And price isn't the only answer.

[Image via maaja03.]

Red Ocean turbulence ahead

Despite the potential upswing of the global economy – there is still great uncertainty and tension in the air.  So to inject a much needed layer of levity, our “Global Recovery Comic Angle” series presents satirical articles of different industries during this period.  Today we showcase ‘Awful Airlines,’ an editorial cartoon roundup by Daryl Cagle depicting the trials and tribulations of air travel.

View the entire slideshow here.

[Image via MSNBC.]