kt's Profile

Super interesting post – I feel like I learned so much about McD! My biggest question after reading your post is related to the concern you raised about the franchise model. I love the efforts from the CEO to collect so much more data, but I wonder if the stores themselves will be able to glean insights from the data and put the changes into effect without some hand holding from corporate. The flipside of that of course is that all of this rich data is collected but never put to good use. However, the graph you included is hard to argue with given the tremendous progress they have seen to date!

Great post – I didn’t know much about Ovia Health before, so was interesting to hear about everything they offer. I know you mentioned the data and privacy concern briefly, but I actually think this is a huge potential concern. As a potential consumer, it gives me pause to think that Ovia could be funneling this highly personal data to my current or future employers – my immediate concern is that this could affect future employment if I’m considered high risk in any way because of my data. Additionally, knowing that they are selling this data to brands also makes me wary of using a product like this down the road.

Really interesting post, Kat! It reminds me a lot of our class discussion on the Flashion case, and I think you really highlighted the same conundrum of data never being a full solution that can replace the creative designers. However, I’m not sure I agree with you that they perhaps swung the pendulum too far. I think that so much has changed in the retail space over this same timeframe with online-only startups coming in and completely disrupting traditional retailers, for example, that I think it’s too difficult to attribute the continued poo performance to the shift to data. You’ve caused me to want to read up more on this topic!

Really interesting post! It’s surprising to me to read that GoFundMe is the largest platform in the space because I would have guessed that both Kickstarter and Crowdrise are formidable competitors. Although perhaps the pressure they are feeling from these two companies is the reason for this drastic shift in business models. I agree with Saurav above that this feels a bit like they may be in trouble. I would be curious to see how many users actually willingly add a tip to their donation – I worry that this won’t be frequent enough to compensate for the loss of the 5% fee that they just gave up. The only potential bright spot I could see working in their favor is if my dropping the 5% fee they can regain and steal major market share and then find other ways to monetize this user base.

This seems to be a new trend among many CPG companies, not just Oreo! I really like your perspective how this approach of crowdsourcing is less about getting value from the power of the crowd, but instead is a tool to engage consumers in an era where it is increasingly more challenge to capture and sustain consumers’ attention. While you pointed out that they have improved the efficiency of their R&D, I do worry somewhat about how distracting these campaigns could be to their core brand and core operations.

I just recently started using Goodreads, so really enjoyed reading your post! My natural inclination was to view Amazon’s purchase of the company as a positive – easier access to quickly purchasing books that are highly recommended by your friends or trusted followers on goodreads. I hadn’t considered the potential backlash that you brought up, but think that’s a real serious threat. I think Goodreads needs to do something to ensure the legitimacy and security of the platform reviews, or it risks losing its entire business.

Really interesting look at the many, many dating apps that proliferate the market today. A few years ago, I felt that each of these different apps would in many ways be fads – many would come and go – but it seems that that may not be the case. I think looking at overall market share isn’t the most fair comparison across the apps since many, as you pointed out, target different parts of the population. I imagine we would see dramatically different market share pictures if we looked by age. I’d be curious to know as well how Coffee Meets Bagel (and Baddo) have been so much more successful than the others at converting free users into paying customers, since ultimately this will be a critical driver of profit and success for these platforms moving forward.

As both an Amazon and Etsy shopper, it was really interesting to read about the different commission and fee structures that they each have. In fact, I didn’t even know that Handmade at Amazon existed, which is surprising given it has been around for 3 years now. I also agree with you that Etsy appears to have a formidable business model against Amazon. I hope that the artists on Etsy can take a lesson from the experience that small business owners have had with selling on Amazon’s marketplace (such as what we saw with the paintball case last week) and perhaps collectively agree to avoid migrating over to Amazon so that they don’t risk getting taken advantage of down the line.

Great overview of ClassPass’s business model, Kat! As a former ClassPass customer, I’ve been really intrigued by these two new updates to their business model. I think the credit approach is quite smart, as it allows users to choose where and how they want to spend their membership as you laid out. However, I’m much less optimistic about the on-demand model with ClassPass Live. I think with the growing competition as MP points out above, quality of these on-demand “do-it-yourself” workouts is going to be essential. Is ClassPass really best suited to be creating this content? Wouldn’t they be better off borrowing content from other players who are more experienced in this?

Great post! One other big factor to consider in the race to winning music streaming is how physical devices (namely, home speakers)will impact the competition. For example, Amazon and Apple both have speaker devices where they can control the music streaming service that launches when you say, “Alexa, play me a song.”

Without any hardware at this point, will Spotify slowly lose its positioning as smart speakers increase their presence?

Great post – this definitely resonated with me as someone who enjoys the movies, but finds it tough to stomach the growing costs with the stagnant innovation!

I just read this article the other day, and think it is relevant – https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/25/moviepass-amc-theaters/. MoviePass abruptly removed access to many of their theaters, and the article alludes to the fact that their economic model may not be sustainable. Will be interesting to see if this is the beginning of their end!

Really interesting example of a company failing to adapt to digital disruption that most of us can relate to! I think your first point on “children getting older younger” is particularly interesting, and a problem many industries will face. I’d be curious to hear your thoughts though on how you think Mattel should counter this trend, as I see them having a few options. Should they make their products more interactive to compete against the iPads and iPhones for a child’s time; make their products more educational (i.e., teaching kids the building blocks to learn to code) to attract to parents, who still own the buying decisions; or focus instead on partnering with the technology that is stealing more and more time by making phone apps, computer games, or partner with popular childrens shows for regular brand appearances to build their brand?

You allude to many of these options throughout your post, but curious where you think the most viable option is!