24A-Green Computer
Green Computer
(1) Opportunity
The opportunity can be best described as the need for being able to trust a computer recycling program for a low fee. In specifically, the people who possess this need are people with computers that they want to recycle and care about the environment. However, the general public holds the need to be environmentally responsible for the price they pay. This creates another important need that the business model has to have. The service must be cheap.
Currently, in the industry, there are plenty of cheap ways to get rid of your computer. Companies such as Best Buy already take computers and recycle them for free. However, programs similar to these have been reviewed and report on in negative ways. There have been reports that the computers that people wanted to recycle were being outsourced to third world countries and rural parts of China. At these places, the workers would take the valuable metals out of the computer but leave the rest of the computer in a large pile to be burned or destroyed through dangerous chemicals that could leak into water sources such as rivers. After reports like these and other internal factors, such as price and hours of operation, many customers are willing to leave their current way of recycling their computer. There has never been that much loyalty because this is a service people only need once every couple of years.
The market can be defined as anyone with a 100 square miles of the facility for the pick service. However, exceptions can be made based on the needs of people who live in rural areas. Beyond that, anyone who brings their computer in can use the service for a low fee.
Overall, this is the biggest opportunity in the industry to be different and offer a service that’s quality is incomparable. The window is going to be open until the needs of the change in the trend of recycling computers are satisfied or the news around recycling computers dies down. Estimates for this would be anywhere between 3-5 years. This is where I want the growth of the company to take place. I want the business to grow in the market and have a good sense of brand with a solid social media outreach to measure the success. Goals for five years would be to have over 100,000 followers on Facebook and have over a 4-star rating on Yelp with over 1000 reviews.
(2) Innovation
The innovation that my business is implementing into the industry is the ability to track the computer as it goes through the recycling steps as a way to build trust between the client and the company. The business model plans to build this trust by tracking the steps the computer is recycled online.
The process the customers will go through starts with getting the computer to the facility. This can be done two ways. The first is by the customer dropping off the computer at the facility. The second is by having one of the pick-up team pick up the computer from the person’s designated location that was registered and paid for online. This is done for a small fee the is just meant to cover the amount for gas. Therefore this fee is calculated before each pick-up. Then for the computer to be taken and recycled each customer must pay for the recycling fee of five dollars. This is meant to be competitive with other recycling programs while still contributing to the upkeep of the online site and the wages of the workers. The customer can choose to take part in the tracking process for no extra fee. This is just having the computer tracked through all stages of recycling as they are done in the facility. This a process where the computer is given labels with a serial number that our computer assigns it so that as the computer is broken down the updates can be given to system to put online. The process can be tracked two ways through an app on the smartphone and online at a login. The app would not be developed first but later after years of development. The computer would have three main metals that would be sold to other companies that would need it, gold, copper, aluminum. The rest can be recycled for other purposes and given to the proper companies that are contracted to receive the supplies. The fee demanded from these businesses that the business would have contracts with would have to change every year as the price of gold and other metals fluctuates frequently. It is important to mention that this business would be one of few that would do all their disassembly of the computer in-the-house. This would drop expenses compared to other programs that have to compensate for this.
(3) Venture concept
The way to get customers to switch will have to be to fill in the broad needs that other recycling consumers fail to fulfill. Another challenge is revealed when people do not need this service on a regular basis. It is reported that people with computers update their computers every 5 years. This is a conservative estimate because this fails to account for people who own multiple computers. This would put more pressure on fulfilling a broad spectrum of needs to attract as many customers as possible.
Currently, the main competitors are public services, small local electronic recycling programs, and Best Buy. these all possess individual problems that cause their customers to become dissatisfied. The reasons people would become dissatisfied with their current way of recycling computers can be broken down into three categories: accessibility (location), price, and environmental responsibility. Customer service is not a key factor in this industry because it is a service that a person only needs once every few years.
Accessibility is defined for this service as ways to have the clients’ computers placed in the area that the business can start to recycle them. Many rural people can not recycle their computer because there is no recycling program in their area. In addition, many people want the most accessible service. Offering pick-up would help satisfy this need.
Price is the rate at which people are asked to pay for the service. This fee will have to be competitive with all other competitors because many competitors change nothing to use the recycling service. In addition, many people care about price more than anything else. This makes price a high priority to attract new customers.
Environmental responsibility is a cause for many people to be dissatisfied with the current way they get rid of their computer. They do want to trust that their computer will not end up in a third world country being broken down in a way that hurt the environment more than if they just threw the computer in the landfill.
(1) Opportunity
The opportunity can be best described as the need for being able to trust a computer recycling program for a low fee. In specifically, the people who possess this need are people with computers that they want to recycle and care about the environment. However, the general public holds the need to be environmentally responsible for the price they pay. This creates another important need that the business model has to have. The service must be cheap.
Currently, in the industry, there are plenty of cheap ways to get rid of your computer. Companies such as Best Buy already take computers and recycle them for free. However, programs similar to these have been reviewed and report on in negative ways. There have been reports that the computers that people wanted to recycle were being outsourced to third world countries and rural parts of China. At these places, the workers would take the valuable metals out of the computer but leave the rest of the computer in a large pile to be burned or destroyed through dangerous chemicals that could leak into water sources such as rivers. After reports like these and other internal factors, such as price and hours of operation, many customers are willing to leave their current way of recycling their computer. There has never been that much loyalty because this is a service people only need once every couple of years.
The market can be defined as anyone with a 100 square miles of the facility for the pick service. However, exceptions can be made based on the needs of people who live in rural areas. Beyond that, anyone who brings their computer in can use the service for a low fee.
Overall, this is the biggest opportunity in the industry to be different and offer a service that’s quality is incomparable. The window is going to be open until the needs of the change in the trend of recycling computers are satisfied or the news around recycling computers dies down. Estimates for this would be anywhere between 3-5 years. This is where I want the growth of the company to take place. I want the business to grow in the market and have a good sense of brand with a solid social media outreach to measure the success. Goals for five years would be to have over 100,000 followers on Facebook and have over a 4-star rating on Yelp with over 1000 reviews.
(2) Innovation
The innovation that my business is implementing into the industry is the ability to track the computer as it goes through the recycling steps as a way to build trust between the client and the company. The business model plans to build this trust by tracking the steps the computer is recycled online.
The process the customers will go through starts with getting the computer to the facility. This can be done two ways. The first is by the customer dropping off the computer at the facility. The second is by having one of the pick-up team pick up the computer from the person’s designated location that was registered and paid for online. This is done for a small fee the is just meant to cover the amount for gas. Therefore this fee is calculated before each pick-up. Then for the computer to be taken and recycled each customer must pay for the recycling fee of five dollars. This is meant to be competitive with other recycling programs while still contributing to the upkeep of the online site and the wages of the workers. The customer can choose to take part in the tracking process for no extra fee. This is just having the computer tracked through all stages of recycling as they are done in the facility. This a process where the computer is given labels with a serial number that our computer assigns it so that as the computer is broken down the updates can be given to system to put online. The process can be tracked two ways through an app on the smartphone and online at a login. The app would not be developed first but later after years of development. The computer would have three main metals that would be sold to other companies that would need it, gold, copper, aluminum. The rest can be recycled for other purposes and given to the proper companies that are contracted to receive the supplies. The fee demanded from these businesses that the business would have contracts with would have to change every year as the price of gold and other metals fluctuates frequently. It is important to mention that this business would be one of few that would do all their disassembly of the computer in-the-house. This would drop expenses compared to other programs that have to compensate for this.
(3) Venture concept
The way to get customers to switch will have to be to fill in the broad needs that other recycling consumers fail to fulfill. Another challenge is revealed when people do not need this service on a regular basis. It is reported that people with computers update their computers every 5 years. This is a conservative estimate because this fails to account for people who own multiple computers. This would put more pressure on fulfilling a broad spectrum of needs to attract as many customers as possible.
Currently, the main competitors are public services, small local electronic recycling programs, and Best Buy. these all possess individual problems that cause their customers to become dissatisfied. The reasons people would become dissatisfied with their current way of recycling computers can be broken down into three categories: accessibility (location), price, and environmental responsibility. Customer service is not a key factor in this industry because it is a service that a person only needs once every few years.
Accessibility is defined for this service as ways to have the clients’ computers placed in the area that the business can start to recycle them. Many rural people can not recycle their computer because there is no recycling program in their area. In addition, many people want the most accessible service. Offering pick-up would help satisfy this need.
Price is the rate at which people are asked to pay for the service. This fee will have to be competitive with all other competitors because many competitors change nothing to use the recycling service. In addition, many people care about price more than anything else. This makes price a high priority to attract new customers.
Environmental responsibility is a cause for many people to be dissatisfied with the current way they get rid of their computer. They do want to trust that their computer will not end up in a third world country being broken down in a way that hurt the environment more than if they just threw the computer in the landfill.
Hi Trenton,
ReplyDeleteI think you've written a great venture concept. Stating the risks at the end were tactfully, I think it's important to be aware of every part of a business plan. You provided great detail and was very thorough throughout the assignment. When you are able to project your idea to your audience in the most simple way is when you are able to make an impact.
Hi Trenton,
ReplyDeleteThis is an awesome analysis of your product and its potential. I like this assignment in particular because it really makes you think and plan out the next steps for success for the business, as you have done really precisely. I think this is an incredible model and concept.
This was a very detailed venture concept! I like how you included what your thoughts are now, where you want to be down to the amount of followers on facebook, down to the risk factors. This is going to be very useful and you wont have to make hardly any changes to your next concept venture assignment. Great work!
ReplyDelete