Category Archives: Consulting

February 5, 2016 · 12:12 pm

Unhealthy Salads

Our Foodie Friday Fun this week comes to us courtesy of the folks at McDonald’s. I happen to like fast food as much as the next person even if I rarely eat it anymore. It’s not a shock to anyone that fast food generally isn’t the optimal way to eat, even if it provides good value for the money. As the trend toward healthier eating has spread, companies such as McDonald’s have seen large sales declines. To their credit, McDonald’s has reversed that problem, mostly by serving their breakfast menu all day long.

English: McDonalds' sign in Harlem.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The other way that McDonald’s has tried to fix the sales problem is by offering healthier menu choices, and that’s our subject today as well as our business point. While they’re still testing some of the new items in this country, in Canada they’ve rolled out a full line of salads featuring kale. After all, what screams “good food choice” more loudly than a salad, right?  Unfortunately, the screaming hasn’t been very positive, as these articles demonstrate.  In fact, when the CBC took a look at the nutrition contained in the new salads they found that:

Some of its nutrient-enhanced meals are actually comparable to junk food, say some health experts. One of McDonald’s new kale salads has more calories, fat, and sodium than a Double Big Mac.

They also found that the Fruit and Maple Oatmeal has close to the sugar in a can of Coke.  Of course, it’s possible to remedy some of the problem by using less dressing on the salad (that’s where a lot of the calories and fat lie) or skipping McDonald’s completely.  But that is neither the problem nor the business point.  Those are about living up to the promises we make.

What McDonald’s is trying to do is to draw consumers in with the promise of a healthier food choice at a great value.  The reality is that most consumers won’t realize that they’re better off eating a Big Mac.  They hear “kale” and “salad” and assume they’re making a healthy choice.  Is that false advertising?  Not exactly, but it sure seems misleading.  That is a big no-no is my book.  Sure, they’re trying to be transparent – the nutritional information of all of their menu items is available – but why should consumers have to double-check?  As marketers, we need to be sure that the messages we send are accurate, even if they’re subliminal.  I think these salads fail that test.  You?

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February 4, 2016 · 12:12 pm

My Bat, My Ball

A long time ago I had a boss who used to recite a little rhyme when he’d get into a discussion with other managers about how something ought to be done. It’s stuck with me: 

My bat, my ball
My ass, my call

In other words, as the person in charge of our division, I’m the one who answers to top management if things go wrong, so I get to decide how things are going to get done. I thought of him as I read the results of a survey by General Electric (GE) and Edelman Berland, which asked respondents to choose their three most challenging best practices to implement for enabling innovation  This was reported by eMarketer.  There were two best practices which the respondents found most difficult to implement.

The first was creating a connected culture where idea-sharing is facilitated and where all the contributing parties are recognized and rewarded.  The second was creating a set of metrics to decide which product or service should be funded or killed, as well as having a clear process and structure in place to manage innovation.  These we cited by over 40% of the survey respondents. What struck me about that, and how it relates to my old boss’ saying, is that both are about control.

With respect to the first point. If you’ve worked in any organization larger than a handful of people you’ve probably come across the dreaded silo effect.  You know what I mean: people not allowing anyone outside of their immediate group to see into their area and the lack of communication and cross-departmental support often found in large companies.  As a boss, you can mandate that people play nicely with other departments but the reality is that unless you proactively facilitate it and monitor it, it doesn’t really happen.  The second half of the point about reward is also about control since rewarding subordinates is often how managers keep people in line.  Shocking news: managers often play favorites irrespective of some folk’s contributions.

With respect to the second point.  That same boss had another saying: let’s not let the facts get in the way of a good story. Again, a control issue.  He wanted to decide what we did and how we did it.  We would innovate HIS ideas and we’d kill something when HE decided, irrespective of the data we had.

The real challenge these points raise is that of being adult enough to relinquish control in order to gain control of the business.  Turning a dictatorship into a benevolent monarchy is hard, but necessary.  Are you up to the task?

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January 29, 2016 · 12:51 pm

The Pimp Of Shrimp

Our Foodie Friday Fun this week comes to us courtesy of “Restaurant Startup“, a show on CNBC. If you’ve never seen it, the people behind two restaurant concepts pitch for an investment. One is selected, given a budget, and has 24 hours to produce a pop-up version of that concept. If all goes well, they receive an investment. This week’s episode featured a fast-casual concept restaurant serving South African food. What struck me as I watched the show is something from which any business can learn. 

The restaurant is called Peli Peli Kitchen and the food was really good according to the people who tried it.  Of course, many people had no idea what the food was as they were ordering it because the menu descriptions of this unfamiliar cuisine (can you name a South African dish off the top of your head?) were terrible.  One dish was described as “the pimp of shrimp”.  Say what?

The issues with the descriptions were pointed out to the guy producing the menu early on.  He did a very smart thing as he was editing.  He had his young son read the menu and tell him what the food was.  Of course, when he asked the kid if he knew what “the pimp of shrimp” was, the kid had no idea.  I’m not sure if the writer was in love with his alliteration, but he didn’t change the description.  Not surprisingly, when the hosts and potential investors asked diners who were waiting in line if they knew what the various dishes were, based on the description, most said no.

The point is pretty obvious.  We can’t do things in business that confuse our customers.  We can’t be so in love with our own clever marketing that we lose sight of that marketing’s main purpose: to inform consumers about the product so that consumers become customers.  I realize that some marketers like to cause confusion – think placing sugary fruit juices near the fresh fruit as an example – but I’m not a fan of that technique.  If we need to cause confusion to sell a product we probably ought to rethink the product.

The menu confusion, in this case, wasn’t a deliberate attempt to mislead.  It was just dumb.  Then again, how many pimps of shrimp are on your marketing materials?

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