Overview
Founded in 2009 by Erik Lyons and Steve Howard, Local Farmbag began when a small farmers market in downtown Savannah went on hiatus. The founders felt the need to continue connecting customers with weekly home-delivered and locally grown organic produce to one’s doorstep every week.
Hoping to expand the business to 7 other cities, the project highlights the brand diagnostics workshop used to uncover challenges and opportunities, setting the direction for the next phase of the workshop. Later, a co-creation workshop was held with 4 activities specifically tailored to map future actionable goals on a strategy roadmap on how they can achieve their future infrastructure and expansion targets.
My role was to facilitate the workshops with the client, provide a unified strategic direction for developing the the workshop structure, flow and content and finally guide the development of a consolidated strategy template.
Problem Summary
Local Farmbags’ business rapidly grew as the pandemic hit. Deliveries skyrocketed from 500 to 1200 across Florida to South Carolina, as the demand for fresh and organic produce increased. This has brought Local Farmbag opportunities as well as challenges in terms of service operation, team communication, sourcing a variety of produce and taking advantage of technology to ease manual processes.
On undertaking a Brand Diagnostics Workshop, we uncovered insights towards their strengths and weaknesses through the past decade. Hence highlighting the opportunity to focus on an infrastructure and expansion plan to set up community-supported agriculture programs across new cities with a broader mission to create a positive impact on the local food systems nation-wide
Approach
Client Kick-Off
Secondary Research
Conducting the Brand Diagnostic Workshop
Planning the
Co-Creation Workshop
Designing a
Co-Creation Workshop
Developing the Strategy Template
Understanding the entrepreneurs, brand, customers, competitors, processes and ideal vision.
Conducting secondary research to learn more about their industry, define stakeholders and align with key findings from the kick-off meeting.
Facilitating a workshop with the entrepreneurs to diagnose the current state of the brand subsequently defining and prioritizing areas of opportunity along the short, medium and long term timeline.
Conducted a site visit to comprehend the current infrastructure, backend processes, warehouse operations & management.
Building a cohesive
co-creation workshop to ignite creative thinking and help address the problem statement.
A comprehensive Strategy guide integrating design thinking and management mindset eventually assisting various aspects of the business.
OPPORTUNITIES
OUTCOMES
BRAND DIAGNOSTIC WORKSHOP
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The brand diagnostic workshop gave us insights into the pains and gains of the company efforts in the service offerings leading to new opportunities.
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The brand diagnostic workshop comprised of, How to make toast, a ice-breaker activity, dreams and nightmares, brand DNA, gains pains questions & ideas, time versus impact map, strategic action plan.
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The dreams and nightmares activity as well as brand DNA helped us align the vision of each stakeholder with the company mission.
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Ideas from the pains, gains, questions and ideas activity were mapped on a time versus impact map that highlighted the need for an evolved infrastructure and improved processes for future expansion to nearby cities.
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Finally the Strategic Action Plan was the last task. Here stakeholders had the opportunity to combine the final thoughts and understandings developed throughout the earlier activities to produce a clear set of measures necessary to achieve a strategic aim in a reasonable amount of time.
CO-CREATION WORKSHOP
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Based on the identified opportunity space; Infrastructure & Expansion, our team designed 4 activities; Service Blueprint, the Infrastructure Prototype, Business Model Canvas, and A Road Map.
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We started the Co-Creation Workshop by analyzing their “As-is” service scenario, where we identified gaps and how the operations can be re-organized efficiently and effectively into the “To -be” service scenario.
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The infrastructure prototype tests physical objects and environments to help Local Farmbag develop a well structured assembly line in their warehouse.
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The Business Model Canvas will help the company gain insights into external actors and activities that would support the service while expanding to another city.
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The final activity - A Road map, converges previously identified goals in addition to new ideas into a realistic and achievable list of tasks, to be done over a 5-year plan.
Brand Diagnostic Workshop
The workshop consisted of several sequential activities to evaluate various aspects of the client's brand, like the messaging, competitors, and brand positioning. The workshop helped the entrepreneur identify and prioritize specific questions, issues, and opportunities for the short, mid, and long-term solutions leading to an opportunity statement.
The main objective here is to have “all-in” from the stakeholders—not only consensus but also commitment—who will then feel more engaged to activate and execute the strategic action plan instead of just signing off or buying in to a pre-prepared proposal from another department or an external agency.
How to make Toast
7 mins
1
Dreams & Nightmares
7 mins
2
Brand DNA
7 mins
3
Gains, Pains, Question, Ideas
Time vs Impact
Map
15 mins
15 mins
4
5
Strategic Action
Plan
15 mins
6
Break
10 mins
How to Make Toast
How to Make a Toast is a fresh and fun warm-up activity to familiarize the clients with post-its, enable clients to focus and break the ice. Further, it teaches the key concepts of different mental models and provides a simple but powerful approach to help teams unpack complex problems more collaboratively and effectively by fostering clarity, engagement and alignment.
Dreams & Nightmares
Dreams and nightmares are a fairly unconventional approach to talking about hopes & fears. It helped our clients - Erik, Steve, and Jesse lay out all their dreams and nightmares regarding Local Farmbag.
As participants in the activity, Erik, Steve, and Jesse were able to learn more about and acknowledge each other's thoughts and opinions about the different departments of the company in which they are involved.
As facilitators, we got an insight into our client’s minds and their dreams about Local Farmbag. This helped us think & connect our potential opportunity spaces while working in our data synthesis stage.
DREAMS
NIGHTMARES
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Our clients dream of a better website that would pose further accessibility to their services.
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Expanding their business to other cities by potentially standardizing their system and creating templates through which they could replicate their business easily.
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Creating a greater impact on the food systems by working towards more sustainable and efficient methods and supporting more farmers.
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Customer satisfaction would help reach a broader customer base as well as staff satisfaction by providing more staff benefits and better wages.
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Bad quality produce: Fears arise around the lack of good quality produces delivered by farmers which could jeopardize the brand image
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Losing their assets due to a natural disaster or an economic turndown could affect: The clients have a fear of being hit by a natural disaster which could lead to losing all their assets. An economic turndown
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External equipment & management software failing: Incidents were that the cooler fails to result in condensation of the produce which turns the produce bad. Local Farmbag records customization to weekly orders on excel, the routing lists fail to be generated when the software fails to sync.
Brand DNA
This exercise helped different clients in the same team realize what others think Local Farmbag stands for. It also visually gave us an idea of what is the essence of Local Farmbag in three simple words:
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Quality: This is what Local Farmbag is pursuing and also what Local Farmbag is offering to customers.
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Farm Fresh: Local Farmbag connects farms to the consumers and brings consumers fresh produce of high quality.
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Community: Local Farmbag aims to build a relationship with the community.
Gain, Pains, Questions, Ideas
Through Gains, we found out what Local Farmbag’s biggest & smallest wins were, and what has worked in the past and is currently working in their favor. In this space, we learned many interesting facts that we were not aware of through our secondary research.
Gains
Through Pains, we are able to find what current pressing issues are for Local Farmbag. It is also an opportunity for Local Farmbag to consider what the future action is and also understand the things which are beyond their control.
Pains
Questions
Through Questions, we convert pains in the last activity into more specific questions. Every question in this activity points to a more specific action plan.
Ideas
Through a very exciting exercise about Ideas, and lots of great ideas are generated from clients. There are some potential actions and new ideas in different aspects for developing Local Farmbag to the ideal status.
Time VS Impact Map
Through this activity, we visualized and analyzed the feasibility and priority of coping with our pains, considering solutions of questions, and implementing ideas in the last activity. We selected high-impact plans and divided them into short-term, mid-term, and long-term areas.
Strategic Action Plan
The Strategic Action Plan was the last task in the brand diagnostics workshop. Here stakeholders have the opportunity to combine the thoughts and understandings developed throughout the earlier activities to produce a clear set of measures necessary to achieve a strategic aim in a reasonable amount of time.
Area of Opportunity
These areas are some of the areas where local farmbag currently needs to improve, but also different opportunities to gain competitiveness and stand out from competing markets. These opportunities include situations that can be solved in the short term at a low cost, as well as long-term goals that are relatively time-consuming.
Potential Directions
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Infrastructure
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Assembly line
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How the space should cater to their delivery process - efficient use of space and also creating a space which helps them function to their best capacity
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Expansion
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Local Farmbag in 7 cities
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The first city they want to expand to is Chicago
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"How Might We Expand Local Farmbag Into New Cities Effectively And Efficiently?"
Co-creation Planning - Site Visit
We visited the Local Farmbags' warehouse in Garden City, Georgia. Located in the Savannah State Farmers Market, the warehouse is around 375 square ft. It is the primary place where the produce comes in from the farmers and is sorted through and put into the bags and dispatched for delivery.
Co-Creation Workshop
The workshop consisted of 4 sequential activities to evaluate various aspects of the client's brand, like the service offering, process flow, dependencies within the service, subsequently service transition from the current state to the ideal state, ideal infrastructure layout, business model emphasizing on the brands unique value proposition and ultimately mapping out tasks gathered from previous activities onto a roadmap. The workshop helped the entrepreneur identify and prioritize specific goals to be achieved over a span of 5 years.
Service Blueprint
"As is" + "To-Be"
1
Infrastructure
Prototype
2
3
Strategy
Roadmap
4
45 mins
45 mins
45 mins
Business Model Canvas
45 mins
Break
10 mins
Break
10 mins
Break
10 mins
Service Blueprint
"As Is Scenario"
The “As is” service blueprint is a thorough visualized map that describes the current state of the service experience. This will help the clients identify gaps and interdependencies between different teams with an opportunity to strategize and organize tasks to deliver the service in the most efficient way possible.
In the "As Is" service blueprint, the aware phase is very essential stage for Local Farmbag. This is the phase that describes how customers learn about the service. Currently 'word of mouth' marketing is the most prominent way new customers learn about Local Farmbag. They are dependent on friends and family spreading the word which has been working for Local Farmbag.
The sign up phase essentially draws interested customers to subscribe for the service. It is important that this phase is quick and simple. In the current scenario the customer visits the website, hits the sign up button to subscribe. Here they fill out their basic information, size of the bag, frequency of the order and submit the form. In the backend Eriks team receives the details of the new customer. Within four days Sarah from Erik's front- end (communication/customer relations) team calls the customer to confirm their subscription. Finally the customer shares the payment details completing the subscription process. This process takes almost a week to complete.
The sign up phase essentially draws interested customers to subscribe for the service. It is important that this phase is quick and simple. In the current scenario the customer visits the website, hits the sign up button to subscribe. Here they fill out their basic information, size of the bag, frequency of the order and submit the form. In the backend Eriks team receives the details of the new customer. Within four days Sarah from Erik's front- end (communication/customer relations) team calls the customer to confirm their subscription. Finally the customer shares the payment details completing the subscription process. This process takes almost a week to complete.
The delivery phase is pretty straightforward. The drivers drop off the produce bags to the customers address. Along with the produce bags they also have to coordinate dry goods/frozen meat separately from the cooler trunks loaded in the truck. Finally the customer is charged for the produce and receives a notification of the amount deducted.
Analysis
After understanding the "as is" process of their service, our team brainstormed ways in which they could improve the different phases making the service experience desirable to both the end users and employees of Local Farmbag. Following are a list of suggestions we think would benefit Local Farmbag:
As much as this 'word of mouth marketing' has been successfully working for them, it also limits them to a certain type of customer segment. Local Farmbag has an excellent opportunity to broaden their customer base by employing multiple marketing strategies which will significantly increase their visibility in the market.
The sign up process can be faster by eliminating the followup call by the frontend team. The customers can provide their payment details while signing up for the subscription. Incase the customers have any questions about the service, they should be able to contact a customer service team via call or email.
For the preparation phase, our team felt automating a few manual process, like preparing newsletter, preparing the routing list for each days delivery could help make the phase more efficient by allowing Steve to prepare the bags a day before the delivery and allowing Erik the time to focus on other areas of his role like managing social media content.
Our team suggests Local Farmbag should keep their customers informed on the delivery details and details of the driver. This way the customers know when to expect the delivery and can contact the drivers to communicate any special needs around the delivery process. Once the produce is delivered, we highly recommend feedback loops and review channels where customers can communicate their needs and experiences. This builds a transparency and trust between the service providers and customer.
Service Blueprint
"To Be Scenario"
The “To Be” service blueprint was developed to support improved processes with the service, visualizing an ideal scenario. This helped the clients map out an ideal service that align to the business goal by reducing redundancies, improving the employee experience, or converging siloed processes.
In the new aware phase Local farmbag expands its visibility and brand awareness by incorporating social media channels namely Tik-Tok, Instagram and Facebook. They also wish to incorporate ad-pop ups as another means to market and promote the brand. These methods will help them reach a larger audience, catering to different customer segments. There will be a local content creator hired as part of Eriks backend team who will handle these channels with additional support of local marketing agencies.
The new sign up process will constitute of a new website and a mobile application allowing customers the flexibility and ease to remain active with the service. While signing up, in addition to providing the basic details, customers will also provide the order date and payment information. Incase the customers have any questions or concerns they can reach out to the customer service team also the tech support team. The new customer is logged into the system via data capturing system. The new sign up process drastically reduces the time to 5 to 10 minutes.
The new preparation phase starts with Steve communicating with the farmers on next weeks available produce. He creates a list and shares it with Erik, on the basis of which he builds the newsletter and sends it out to the customers on Sunday as well as updates the list to the website. This time the newsletter provides the customers a link to the website where they can customize the produce bag with necessary add on or substitutions. Once they place the order, Erik holds onto the payment until the bags are delivered. The order details are recorded automatically generating a routing list of the orders with the help of a routing software. Parallel to this process, Steve and his local assistant procure the produce from the farms. they bring the produce to the warehouse where the supervisor updates the inventory of produce and dry goods via an inventory management software. The rest of the warehouse team starts sorting and portioning the produce. With the routing list available almost immediately, the team starts preparing and labeling the bags according to the customer locations a day before. The supervisor then quality checks and makes sure the produce bags are filled with the correct items and updates the inventory. Along with the warehouse team, he then fills the storage rack with completed produce bags according to the delivery areas. The drivers come in the next morning and the warehouse team loads the truck with the bags.
Once the drivers head out for the delivery, the customers receive a notification of the delivery details and drivers contact details allowing them to reach out to the drivers incase of any special needs/requests. once the delivery is completed, Erik processes the payment. the customers can leave their feedback on the website or mobile application received by the internal customer service team. Satisfied customers can join the social media channels to share and stay involved with the community via the website or app. The content will be handled by the local content manager and marketing agency.
Recommended Tasks & Goals
The service blueprint activity successfully captured Local Farmbags' ideal future service, helping the clients identify key tasks and goals that are to be completed in order to accomplish the ideal service Local farmbag wishes to provide.
Infrastructure Prototype
(Desktop Walk-through)
Through this activity, clients are given an opportunity to build a prototype of the ideal warehouse and a detailed plan of the ideal conference room. Different aspects of the infrastructure were also discussed in the process of prototyping leading to a well structured assembly line and checklist for expansion.
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This helps the clients further explore and validate core functionality and the role of these objects and space planning in the context of the future service scenario.
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Identified pain points
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Limited space and access to the cooler give packaging activity difficulties.
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There are three rooms in the warehouse, and the only door to the cooler inside the warehouse is in the middle room.
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While packaging bags, three people go to these three rooms individually and get into the cooler to get fresh produces. The only access door is in the middle room, so it is not convenient for the other two people in the other rooms.
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The separate area for storing the dry goods
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The dry goods such as meat and cheese are stored in the conference room, which is not next to the warehouse.
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The waiting time for the preparation of routing lists
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Business Model Canvas
The business model canvas is a great tool to help understand a business model in a straightforward, structured way leading to insights about the customers Local Farmbag serves, what value propositions do they offer through what channels, and how your company makes money.
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Here we look at all the external actors that can help support different aspects of their business while expanding into new cities
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The Business Model Canvas helped better understand the Who, What, How and Why of Local Farmbag and how that can aid in the Expansion process.
Analysis
We synthesized the data points from the Business Model Canvas using the help of a flowchart to visualize interconnections and identify missing links upon which we were able to recognize actionable steps for the expansion process.
Business Model Flowchart
Actionable Steps Identified
Strategic Roadmap - 5yr Plan
The roadmap is the strategic planning tool for the managers of the business that clearly communicates deliverables and the expectations over a span of 5 years. It’s about the ultimate destination (the vision) and the major steps that the team intends to take along the way (goals to be reached, problems to be solved).
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The clients can use this tool with their internal teams and other stakeholders to demonstrate how the service will evolve over time providing team members the information they need to be able to focus their goals and priorities towards
Building the Roadmap
Analysis of Roadmap
Data points from previous activities were synthesized and prioritized on the road map to bring visibility between different teams and help them coordinate their efforts.
Final Outcomes - Strategic Roadmap
We identified 7 buckets that Local Farmbag may consider while planning about the expansion process. These 7 areas have smaller steps that Local Farmbag could work on as time allows to efficiently and effectively expand to a new city.
Hope you enjoyed this project!