30A – Final Reflection

The most formative experience I had was the “What’s Next” because I learned so much at developing my business further. Many people do not know where to go with their business, but I now feel as if I have all of my future business figured out. I will remember coming up with my exit strategy years later. I want my exit to go exactly as planned and incorporate almond butter into my future business. My most joyous experience was probably reading the books that we had to read. I learned so much from them and put a lot of the information toward my everyday life. I am proud of starting this experience in the beginning.

I do see myself as an entrepreneur. As my food truck is not happening at the moment, my almond butter has been made and my sister and I are currently coming up with branding and new flavors. I have developed an entrepreneurial mindset.

I would recommend students to be careful and thoughtful in the beginning of the semester when they pick their business because you have to stick with your same idea the entire semester and grow upon it. Make sure it is something you are very interested in.

29A – Venture Concept No. 2

My healthy food truck is an idea I have had for a few years now. I have gone back and forth between having a nut butter business, a healthy food truck business, or an energy ball business. In the end I decided that it would be best if I did all of these things, but used the healthy meal food truck for this entrepreneurship class currently. My ideas have changed over the course of the semester, but my opportunity, innovation, and venture concept for the healthy food truck remain the same.

As for opportunity goes, I have identified the opportunity as a lack in the health side of food truck businesses. The need goes out to any working human or any person that has a busy schedule and wants food fast and healthy. The nature of the need is current because society wants more and more healthy food because they are learning the importance of it. The environment is becoming more health conscious so creating this opportunity would blend in with society. I do not know much about the market outside of America, but I know many Americans are interested in eating healthy and the benefits it has on your body. Customers currently are satisfied with going to stores like “Whole Foods” to pick up lunch and they pay a lot of money for it. This opportunity would not start off large, but it could eventually be made into a restaurant or the food could be sold at other stores. This opportunity will be open for a while, but we will of course have to adjust to societies changing values.

The new service I am going to offer will be innovative because there is no such thing as a healthy food truck in many locations. My service could begin as a healthy food truck that sells bowls with a base, such as brown rice, quinoa, or noodles, with a veggie of your choice, and with a protein of your choice, such as steak, chicken, tofu, and others. My service could then venture off into making nut butters and selling them at the food truck stand. My nut butters could then be distributed into other stores. My bowl will sell for around $7.00 and my flavored nut butters would sell anywhere from $6.00-$10.00 depending on the kind. I would make the bowls at an estimated cost of $4.00 and I would make the nut butters at an estimated cost of $4.00. My service as a food truck stand would eventually multiply into other locations or simply sell the nut butter and get the nut butter into large stores.

In addition, my innovation would solve the opportunity I identified. As for the healthy food truck goes, people are hungry in their busy days and want quick meals. Also, people want to be healthy so they feel better about them selves and look better. Customers will spend money on this because they are too lazy to cook and they don’t mind spending money on something quick, healthy, and satisfying. A lot of people don’t even know how to cook yummy healthy food, so this food truck will solve a lot of people’s problems. The reason customers would switch to eating here rather than where they normally eat is because of how fast it will be. Getting them to switch will not be hard because I will market it and offer free meals for the first certain number of people. With my company being the word on the street, it is bound to get customers.

The competitors would be places like Vale, Grill Fresh, or Whole Foods because they all offer make your own healthy bowls and have a healthy modern atmosphere like my food truck will be. The competitor’s weaknesses are their locations and their speed and quality of food.  Since my business is on a low scale right now, there would be no packaging needed or much customer service or other ad-in prices. My costs would be paying the worker that serves the food and paying the distributer that we get the food from. Once figuring out those costs, I would focus on business location, which is a large role. The business location must be in a populated area, like downtown Tampa or many other downtown cities that are highly populated. I would have only a few employees at first to see how the business goes. If the business takes off than I would need at least 5 employees at the differing locations. Overall, the venture is an important aspect to my business that I will continue to expand on.

Lastly, my most important resource will be marketing because I know people will love it once they try it for the first time. In addition, next for the venture would be my nut butter which I have created at the moment. The nut butter would branch off of my food truck, but would eventually be sold at local markets and small local stores then sold at large companies like Publix. I came about this idea from a nut butter company called “wild friends”. I will also get popular instagram users to post my product, as well as, starting a page for my product. In 5 years, I see my self solely with my nut butter business and leaving behind my food truck. I see myself similar to the “Wild Friends” nut butter business because these girls are entrepreneurs like myself. I vision my nut butter having different flavors and being produced in a factory and then sold across America. Overall, I'm excited for the future and to start my own business and see where it will take me. I see myself starting a business with my sister in downtown Sarasota and downtown Tampa. I see us starting with my food truck, but ending up with perfected nut butter since we have been working on our nut butter for years. I cannot wait to see what the future brings us.

2) My feedback was positive feedback except for one person saying that making the nut butter would be hard. I received positive feedback, such as, people saying that they followed my venture from the beginning and love the idea. People also said that the nut butter would be a great way for me to expand and make more money. I am happy with the feedback I received.

3) Due to the feedback, I did not want to change much in my venture concept. All I changed was how I was going to go about doing the nut butter business as another business. The rest of my essay I really liked and I think it holds true to my business.

4)

28A – Your Exit Strategy

1) Identify the exit strategy you plan to make. Do you intend to sell your business in the next 5 years for a large return? Do you intend to stay with the business for several decades and retire? Do you intend to protect the venture as a family business, and pass it down to your children?

I plan to stick with my business at least for the next 20 years and then depending how the business is doing I will decide if I want to keep it or sell it. My goal would be to have the business doing good and then stick with it for several decades for my families then retire later. I want to most definitely keep the venture as a family business.

2) Why have you selected this particular exit strategy?

I selected this exit strategy because I love my business I have created and I want it to be a part of my whole life. I do not want a boring office job or a job that I have to work certain hours of the day. I believe having my own business allows me to have my own time and do something I love.

3) How do you think your exit strategy has influenced the other decisions you've made in your concept? For instance, has it influenced how you have identified an opportunity? Has it influenced your growth intentions or how you plan to acquire and use resources?

My exit strategy has influenced my other decisions by showing that I love the business. Since I want to stay with the business that means I will invest the right amount of time into it. My exit strategy has identified how I identified the opportunity because I will have my own time and make my own money form society. It also has influenced how I plan to use my resources because I will be sparingly.

27A – Reading Reflection No. 3

1) What was the general theme or argument of the book?

I chose the book “Innovation and Entrepreneurship” by Peter Drucker and I found it very interesting. The book focused on the premises, “the practice of innovation, the practice of entrepreneurship, and sound entrepreneurial strategies” The overall theme of the book was how to be a successful entrepreneur and how innovation, entrepreneurship and the strategies of entrepreneurship work together in relation to society.

2) How did the book, in your opinion, connect with and enhance what you are learning in ENT 3003?

This book encompasses all of what I have learned in ENT3003. What stood out to me mainly were the ventures, which we learned about in this class. Ventures such as, the existing business and the public service institution. Drucker aims to dominate a new and existing market, which we also learned about in this class. The market does not have to be created to be successful.

3) If you had to design an exercise for this class, based on the book you read, what would that exercise involve?

I would design an exercise that makes students in a group invent a new product in their head on a random day. These students would then have to come up with a market to which their product belongs. Then the students would come up with how to make the product better and how to market the product to the particular market. I believe that group work is very important and must be done to get new ideas.

4) What was your biggest surprise or 'aha' moment when reading the book? In other words, what did you learn that differed most from your expectations?

My biggest ‘aha’ moment in “Innovation and Entrepreneurship” was looking at outside of the enterprise. Looking at demographics, population changes, the countries spoken about made me realize how right Drucker is. I was not surprised by the fact that American teenagers want sneakers, but I was simply informed. I realized that entrepreneurs must cater to specific populations and the changing population.

26A – Celebrating Failure

1)   A recent time I can think of “failure” is losing a team race over thanksgiving break. My friend and I were verse my sister and her friend. The race was a 5k and both teams were determined to win. We decided that the “winner” would be the team’s combined times. So my sister’s friend came in first place, as he is 6 feet and 7 inches tall so he has an advantage. My friend and me finished together in second place and my sister finished last. After calculating the times, it looked as if my sister and her friend won the race with a faster combined time.

2)   I learned from this race that failure could push you to do better. I now want to run more 5k’s and be able to beat everyone in my age division. I also learned that it is okay to fail because sometimes people are naturally better at things.

3)   Failure is hard and embarrassing, but you have to handle it emotionally and behaviorally. Over the years, I did not take failure easily and I would handle it very wrongly with my behavior. I would be so angry when I failed any competition that I did not know what to do. I now know that there is more to life and it is not the end of the world to fail at something. This class has made me realize failure is a good thing many times. I am more likely to take a risk and start my business.