Elevator Pitch No. 4

I decided to change up my elevator pitch drastically and take a more relaxed approach. In the past I attempted to explain my business and I kept failing at coming up with something that would give the person a good idea of what I'm talking about without talking for too long. So, I decided to keep it nice and simple, I think it came out just like I intended, and I think it could leave this hypothetical investor intrigued.

Venture Concept No.2

Opportunity:

One of the first things I noticed when I got to the University of Florida is that the city of Gainesville is filled with a multitude of very diverse places to eat. These people love their food and understand that college students are more likely to eat out or buy meals because its faster and easier than cooking their own meals. It didn't take long for my entrepreneurial mind to start working, I knew there was a market and I just couldn't think of something that could be new, exciting, and that actually could be successful. During my second year of college an idea came to me. I realized what need wasn't being met. I finally understood where I need to focus my thinking on. There was no accessible late night healthy food option. Where could college students get their late night cravings met by a healthy food option? There weren't any. Pizza, burger, wings, etc. That's what their options were. So I saw the potential in the healthy food crazed Millenials at UF. This trend towards being more aware of what you're putting inside your body is taking over the world, and many more people are starting to see the benefits. The group more attracted to this trend are the young people, the aspiring Millenials. As of right now, the only way on-campus students satisfy their late night cravings are through ordering delivery pizza, or from one of the delivery companies. The price of a meal, plus the delivery charge, plus the tip for the driver can get costly, which is why sometimes students opt out of satisfying their needs. I see this as a big opportunity to create something that students will get excited about and will be willing to try and if satisfied will continue to eat.  I see this window of opportunity being open for as long as there is no one that comes up with this idea, and I can't imagine that it would take for someone with the resources at hand to realize.

Innovation:

Having said that, I want to discuss what my innovation is. My plan is to get 3 food trucks and out of them sell healthy meals and snacks that students can buy from 9 pm to 3 am. The way it will work is that, using a mobile app, students will request a food truck. They cannot request their food truck to come just to them, instead they call it to the nearest food truck hub (my plan is to designate various locations around campus, and the more popular off campus areas) where the food trucks will park for a certain amount of time and sell food).The person could be lucky and have a food truck hub right in front of their dorm or apartment complex but if not, then it will be a short  walk away. The more people that request a food truck to a certain location the quicker it will come. My plan is to create a menu that will, ideally, only contain meals strictly under $8, along with small snacks for $1-$2 and bottled drinks. Since I am not a food expert, I plan on hiring a chef to help me create a menu. Aside from making it primarily available to college students, during lunch hours 11 am to 2 pm I will have the food truck go to various business complexes in the area so we could cater to a different demographic.

Venture Concept:

My innovation will address the need for late night cheap healthy food option for students on campus and it will also give people a cheap healthy option for their lunch hour while at work. It will cater to them great food at a low price and with the comfort of not having to go far or pay for a delivery. I think costumers will buy into my business because it will make them feel less bad about themselves for getting hungry late and eating something that is damaging to their health. I imagine that it will be difficult at first, and that it will take a lot of marketing and publicity to kick start the business, but I feel that in due time it will gain a following. My main competitors are all the food options in the area, and the companies that specialize in just delivery. A possible weakness of this idea is the university. It will take many permits and I will probably have to jump through lots of hoops to get it approved by the university and to get their permission to sell my food on campus. Once I get past those difficulties, my main objective will be to create a following and to keep my customers happy. The way I will keep them happy is by keeping my employees happy, and ensuring that they give customers the best possible experience. I hope that as my business grows I will in turn have more food trucks at my disposal and definitely expand to other college towns in Florida.

Minor Elements:

I think what I will have that will allow me to separate myself from my competitors and will make it difficult for them to copy my eventual success is that I understand the mind of the broke college student. Not only that, but I understand that cheap food is not their only concern, and that it is important to eat healthy food as well.

For my next venture after the food trucks, I wish to imitate what I want to do at UF and do it at FSU or UCF.  This will expand my business and through word of mouth create an instant interest in my business at each of those schools.

If my business is successful, and there's potential buyers in 5-10 years then I will most likely sell my business in order to move on to something I am more passionate about than food.

Changes:

I didn't change this venture concept much from the original, but this is a list of changes and additions:

-I decided to not just limit my business to on-campus students but to also make it accessible to off campus students by place food truck hubs in various popular areas.

-Changed my max meal price from $6 to $8, because after some thought, and advice from fellow classmates, I realized that my prices were too low. Considering all the materials and food I have to buy, making a profit may have been extremely difficult, if not impossible.

- I also changed my late night hours of operation from 8 pm-3 am to 9pm-3 am. The reason for this change is because I feel that 8 pm is still a bit early for some people and they may choose to go to a restaurant instead.

-I added my lunch option in order to cater to a different demographic.

Week 14 Reading Reflection

Kuratko Ch. 3 & 4

This reading was probably one of the most enjoyable and useful reads and I'm glad that it was saved for last because its very inspiring to see that I have a lot of the qualities that many successful entrepreneurs have.

In ch. 3, the author discussed how some of the most successful ventures are radical ideas that no one really thinks of, he called these "radical" innovations and it was quite surprising to realize that some of the most important things in our society were quite radical when they first came out such as social media.

There wasn't anything confusing about this chapter to me, it was all pretty straightforward and it seemed more like a motivational chapter than anything. The author did discuss some topics that I could see being confusing for some, for instance when he talked about the mission statement and vision of corporations it was sort of confusing what he was trying to say but I understood what he meant eventually.

Two questions for the author:

1. What are some entrepreneurial mistakes that you have commonly seen in some startups ?

2. After doing extensive research on corporations and how the got their entrepreneurial start, do you think that we have some corporations in the US that are simply too big too fail? If not, what makes even the biggest corporations vulnerable?

I disagreed a bit with the author on his thoughts about the mission statement and vision of companies. I personally find these quite unimportant and out dated.

Google Gold

I honestly made absolutely no effort to use certain keywords in my blog. I also didn't share my blog on social media, its kind of funny because as an entrepreneurship student I should have probably tried to get exposure so I could possibly get more feedback on my business idea.

IF I would've taken this into consideration earlier in the course I probably would've tried to come up with a name for my business, which I still have yet to do, and try to include certain phrases such as "healthy food" and "college campus" in order to be more visible to people that search these things. I also probably would've shared my blog on facebook, a great place to get feedback from older people in your friends list (they tend to comment more). I honestly probably wouldn't have gone much deeper than that.

My most "viral" post was the one for the "Free Money" assignment. The reason I think this got so much traffic is because it is probably the best assignment I've done all year, and I put a lot of videos and even my failed attempts at getting people to take my money. It has a good amount of comments and I think that may be due to some students not completing the assignment and getting the points for commenting. Also, I did get a lot of views on it and I think that may be due to the fact that it was a pretty funny assignment and I think maybe some people may have shared my link.

Unfortunately, I failed miserably at getting exposure on google. I tried a vast array of keywords related to my business idea and a plethora of other words that appeared frequently throughout my posts, but none of those combinations worked. After looking through several pages on google through all the different combinations I had, I finally gave up and included "ENC3003" which finally gave my post on the results.

Very Short Interview, Part 2

For the first "Very Short Interview" assignment I was unable to speak to  an entrepreneur before the deadline and unfortunately I as unable to conduct an interview. But, this time around I called my uncle, Richard Centauro, owner of Tents N' Events (event planning company), and asked him a few questions about his business and his experience as an entrepreneur.

Questions and answers:

1. What was the biggest obstacle you faced when trying to start your business?

We first took the idea from a company in New York and applied it to South Florida, and since that company was so successful we had close to no trouble convincing our "well-off" family members to lend us money to get started, which can be difficult for many businesses. So, thankfully that wasn't too difficult, but what was difficult was getting the word out and getting customers. After a few months I honestly thought we were done, but all of the sudden we got around September and what we now call our "busy season" and we took off.

2. As a man with no entrepreneurial experience and barely any money, what made you take such a huge leap and just go for it?

Well, I got tired of working for someone, I was a manager at a Winn-Dixie and I didn't make that great of a salary and I wanted something bigger. My brother told me about the possibility of opening this business and I was in from the second he told me.

3. What would you tell me and my fellow classmates about entrepreneurship?

I would tell you to not be afraid to go for it. I did it as a middle aged man with a family and with a lot more to lose than young college students. If I can do it, you bright kids can do it too, plus you all go to UF and there's brilliant minds all around you that I'm sure will be able to help you.

After conducting this interview  I did feel more enthusiastic about the possibility of actually materializing my business idea and taking a big leap. 

Week 13 Reading Reflection

Kuratko Ch. 14 (Valuation of Entrepreneurial Ventures)

The first thing that comes to mind when thinking of surprises in the reading is all the different aspects that go into placing a value on a business. Sometimes  we think businesses are more simple than they actually are. Which is something to keep in mind when entering a venture. 

Nothing was particularly confusing. The author was thorough and unlike most chapter it was pretty straightforward.

Two questions:

1. If you had to value an up and coming business what method of valuation would you use?

2. Which of the methods would fit better for a food business?

I had no disagreements with anything the author said in this chapter.

Celebrating Failure

Thankfully this semester hasn't been too complicated for me. My classes are relatively easy and aren't painful. So, if I had to talk about failure in this semester I don't have much to choose from, except for a small aspect of my performance in my public speaking class. My failure has been to continuously use "um" when I've done speeches during class. This is the one mistake that comes to mind that I have yet to fix during my speeches. It's just one of those things that I practice and always get it correct before presenting in class, but when I get up there I do it. It's probably just nerves but I have to eliminate it because some people may notice it and it becomes annoying to them. I have my final speech in 10 days and I hope to have conquered this obstacle by then.

I think failure is necessary. Everyone experiences failure at some point in their lives, but it is how we recover from failure that matters. I have failed countless times but I carry on. I will continue to fail and I will continue to learn and carry on. If I want to be a successful entrepreneur I must understand this and know that its just the way life is. I think that this class has certainly helped reinforce that idea.