Dare to be different

“Get out of the crowd.”  That was the call to imagination by Jean-Jacques Vandenheede (AC Nielsen). He issued the challenge as he outlined the value of a Global Idea Factory where being different was the success factor.

There were, he pointed out, 11,000 different models of mobile phone, but “there is only one iPod, the real multi-media machine”.  He went on: “It is not the easiest to use, and it is not the smallest.  It does not have the longest lasting battery and it is not the most sophisticated.  It has not the largest capacity or offers the best price value.  But it is the market leader.”

He described Dream Dinners, a rapidly expanding US concept based on meal assembly to a customer’s personal requirements.  “You select a timed cooking session and choose the dinners.  When you arrive a crew awaits you and all the ingredients are prepared.  You then supervise the cooking.  You master the whole managing process of these meals and customise it.  “In two hours Dream Dinners can assemble 12 menus at a cost of between three and five US dollars.  It’s cheaper than takeaway, faster than frozen, faster than DIY.  Now they are opening 40 stores a month.”

A partnership between L’Oréal Hellas and the Veropoulos chain of stores had resulted in a 15 per cent sales increase in cosmetics. This was achieved after identifying the cause of stagnating sales as an antiquated approach to display and packaging.  The mission of change required co-operation and inventiveness and a determination to move fast.  By changing the environment so that cosmetics were sold from a boutique-style display, creating its own colourful space the partners had gained “the seal of approval from the customers themselves”.

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