Embracing Constraints Lean Startup Case-Study

1. Embracing Constraints
Aesop’s Garden // 4.12.2011

2. Like creativity & giving
things personality

3. Overview
ie ws
erv
Int
s ti on
ew u
rv
i Sol a les
s e + S
va Int ild ild ng
an Bu Bu
ti
ti ng C lem o ra
ta
r
ea
n
ro
b
em VP e ne
S L P D M G
00 Inspiration 01 Starting 02 Lean Canvas 03 Problem Interviews 04 Demo Build
05 MVP Build 06 Today & Onward

4. 00
Inspiration

5. 01
ie ws
erv
Int
s ti on
i ew lu les
rv So a
ng
s e + S
va nt ui
ld ng
rti an
I ild ti
C lem
B Bu er
a
S ta Lea
n
P ro
b
Dem
o
M
VP
G en
00 Inspiration 01 Starting 02 Lean Canvas 03 Problem Interviews 04 Demo Build
05 MVP Build 06 Today & Onward

6. 01 3 months of very
LOTS OF
IDEAS
WASTED
EFFORT
little produced
NOT
GOOD
ISOLATED
Found Help: + +

7. ›Get connected with other entrepreneurs
›Share your ideas
Lessons Learned ////////////////////////////////////

8. 02
v as w s
les
vie
C an nt
e r
ld ng
Sa
I ui ild i
an
t
ting lem o
B Bu ra
ar e ro
b
em VP ne
St L P D M Ge
00 Inspiration 01 Starting 02 Lean Canvas 03 Problem Interviews 04 Demo Build
05 MVP Build 06 Today & Onward

9. Users
TRIBES GARDEN, GALAXY,
PLANETS
SEEDLINGS PARENTS STAKEHOLDERS CREATORS & SPREADERS TRIBES THE WORLD
WANT STORIES THAT INTEREST DEVELOPING THINKING SKILLS WANT TO STAY CONNECTED TO WANT TO BE ABLE TO CREATE TEACHING VALUES THE WORLD IS AN UNTAPPED
& CHALLENGE THEM & TEACHING SOCIAL VALUES THE SEEDLINGS. WANT TO BE STORIES STRENGTHEN THEIR BONDS PEARL THAT WANTS TO BE
PART OF THEIR LIFE AS MUCH BROUGHT TO LIFE
HAVE AN UNLIMITED DIFFICULT TO TO CREATE AS POSSIBLE SHARE THEM FOR THE GREATER DON’T HAVE A WAY TO CREATE
CREATIVITY BUT NOT GIVEN A PERSONALIZED STORIES GOOD & HELP OTHERS SOLVE & COMMUNICATE STORIES
DIGITAL MEAN TO EXECUTE WANT SEEDLINGS TO KNOW PROBLEMS EASILYTHEM
FINDING PREFERRED STORIES THEIR MEANING OR RELATION
TIME CONSUMING SHIP SHARE THEM FOR RECOGNI
TION
GUIDANCE ON HOW TO WANT TO HELP IN THEIR
INTERACT WITH CHILDREN GROWTH & DEVELOPMENT
THERE ISN’T A WAY TO HAVE
LIVING SHAREBRITE
WANT TO TRANSMIT &
EDUCATE IMPORTANT STORIES
TO THEIR CHILDREN
?

10. Lean Canvas I started with
3/11/2011
Aesop's Garden
Lean Canvas
Problem Solution Unique Value Unfair Advantage Customer
No simple way to Stories and games that Proposition My creative insight Segments
create personalized can be personalized for We help develop into creating suprising Parents - working
stories or games digital devices thinking skills in nuggets of joy. parents that are tech
Children's interest Have wide amount of children & strenghten Building a brand that is savy. Have smart
change often and it is content on the site social ties by letting admired and worth phones or ipads, create
time consuming for parents put the talking about facebook accounts for
Have stories that focus
parents to get new important people, (Hopefully) their children
on social values places, and events into
content Family Members -
Offer service to create the stories their who want to be part of
Difficult to find stories personalized stories children create. the child's life
that teach the right
social values Seedlings - wants to be
Key Metric Distribution interested by the
Children love to see Channels
themselves in stories Customers purchasing content of the stories.
but can't do so. stories Aesopsgarden.com Groups - Schools,
Every customer Customers Sharing teams that want to
bringing us three new Group stories teach something to
customers! seedlings
Cost $tructure Revenue $treams
Customer Acqusitions - Free Individual Stories and Games accessible at $6 - $20
Story Illustration - $300? Custom story creation as a service - Individuals & Groups
Server fees or hosting fees - ? Free trial
http://leancanvas.com/canvases/753 1/1

11. Hacked Landing Page
+ =
Had Personality & Worked

12. 03
ws
ie ws erv
ie
nt
e rv on
I
nt uti
I Sol a les
s
lem
+ S
va ild ild ng
an Bu ti
ting C
ob o Bu
ne
ra
St
ar
Le
an
Pr Dem M
VP
G e
00 Inspiration 01 Starting 02 Lean Canvas 03 Problem Interviews 04 Demo Build
05 MVP Build 06 Today & Onward

13. I thought (Hypotheses)
›Personalization mattered
›Education & games could be a value
›Digital stories would be appealing (solution)
›Content was difficult to find
Experiments //////////////////////////////////////////

14. w Asking Open Ended Questions
w No Script
w Not diving deep enough
Couldn’t extract conclusions

15. Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with me today.
We are currently working on a tool that helps parents strengthen social ties by letting them take the important people, places,
and put them into their children's stories. The idea for the tool came from my own experiences interacting with my niece who
lives in Monterrey, MX
But before getting too far ahead of ourselves, I wanted to pause and take the time to learn how other families stay connected
and use stories to see if there are real problems here worth solving.
The way the interview works is: I’ll start by describing the main problems we are tackling and then I’ll ask if any of those
resonate with you. I’d like to stress that we don’t have a finished product yet and our objective is learning from you - not selling
or pitching to you.
Does that sound good?
How many children do you have & what are their ages?
Do they go to public school or private school?
What kind of technology do you let your child interact with?
Do you have family members who in live in a different city?
How often do you read to your child?
How many children’s books do you buy per month?
Have you ordered a photo book or personal story book before.
Who buys the books in your family?
Do you buy bilingual books?
&
Great, thanks. So let me tell you about the problems we are tackling:
So the first problem I encountered was that it was difficult for my niece and I to develop a relationship since we live in different
places. We only got to see each a few days every 3 months and I wanted her to know me as a family member, not a stranger.
So the second problem I came up against is that I wanted to make her a story book that would have real pictures of us on an
adventure so even when I wasn’t there she could have Even with my design background I found it was still complicated and a
lot of work. There wasn’t a way for me to create a personalized story with real pictures.
Finally, once I started working on the story, I didn’t know what to write. I didn’t know what story would be the most effective
and what she would like.
So to summarize problems:
1. Wanted my niece to know me as family member even though I didn’t get to spend a lot of direct time with her.
2. I wanted a process to make a personalized story in very little time.
3. Wanted guidance in picking the right content for the story to be.
Do any of these problems resonate with you?
How would you rank these problems?
Have you run into any other problems I didn’t talk about?
So how you do deal those problems today
Thanks a lot for your time today. You have been very helpful.
As I mentioned at the start, this isn’t a finished product. Based on what we talked about today, would you be willing to see the
product when we have something ready?
Also, we are looking to interview other people like yourself. Do you know any other parents with children ages 2-7 who you
think we could interview?
+
Me Help

16. #1 Developing Family Relationships
#2 No time to solve #1
#A Print was a solution wanted

17. 18 w Within 5 min. validated
w Connecting to Evangelists
w Story Ideas & Blog Posts
Had a real problem + focus

18. I thought (Hypotheses)
›Personalization mattered
›Education & games could be a value
›Digital stories would be appealing (solution)
›Content was difficult to find
Customers Told Me (Insights)
›Developing family relationships is important (problem)
›Parents don’t have any free time (problem)
›Printed Stories Matter (solution)
Lessons Learned ////////////////////////////////////

19. Next Steps (Future Experiments)
›Build Demo Story that shows Unique Value
›Test Pricing
Lessons Learned ///////////////////////////////////

20. 04
ie ws
erv
Int
s ti on
i ew ild ol
u
les
rv
Bu
s e S Sa
va nt +
an
I
o ild ti ng
ng lem Bu ra
em
C
rti n b VP ne
St
a
Lea P ro D M G e
00 Inspiration 01 Starting 02 Lean Canvas 03 Problem Interviews 04 Demo Build
05 MVP Build 06 Today & Onward

21. UH
OH
Couldn’t create the demos myself
› Illustrated Story
› Using Pictures
› Hardcopy Print
Wasn’t optimized for speed

22. Big MVP Risk
w s
rvie a les
s e S
va Int ui
ld ild ng
an B Bu
ti
ti ng C lem o ra
ta
r
ea
n
ro
b
em VP e ne
S L P D M G

23. Big Risk n ts
e
ws itm s
rv
ie m ale
om
a s t e S
nv In ld g
ui C ild in
g Ca lem
B Bu at
et
n r
arti an o b m
o
VP en
e
St Le Pr De G M G
w s
r vie a les
s e S
va Int ui
ld ild ng
an B Bu
t i
ting C lem o ra
ta
r
ea
n
ro
b
em VP e ne
S L P D M G

24. Work Flow Comparison
Design User Input Production Output
Concept Illustrated Text Upload Pictures Render Text Render Pics P.O.D.
Scary MVP
Concept Lines Text Render Text Self Print
Reduced MVP

25. Critical Pivot
Talked to peers.
»Got 3 commitments
»Deadline = Pressure
»Covered 75% of Demo

26. FAR APART, CLOSE TOGETHER
w Slightly Personalized
w Not sure about faces
w Strongest for problem #1
send messages through animal friends
make Tuesday crazy hat day!

27. Tears of Joy (almost from both of us)
“I’ve got to tell you that this is SUCH a sweet idea!”
“LOVE the coloring book! Is it okay if I forward it to some of my friends?”
Yes! Please!

28. Customers Told Me (Insights)
›Coloring Stories do solve problem #1 (solution)
›Elements had potential for sharing (key metric)
Embracing Constraints
›Found the true MVP
›Made me focus on the UVP
›Found an illustrator with true passion
Lessons Learned ////////////////////////////////////

29. 05
a les
s S
ng
w
as te
rvie
u ild ti
ild B a
er
v In
an Bu
ting C lem o
VP n
an
Ge
ar b
St Le P ro D em M
00 Inspiration 01 Starting 02 Lean Canvas 03 Problem Interviews 04 Demo Build
05 MVP Build 06 Today & Onward

30. Next Steps (Future Experiments)
›Build MVP (solution)
›Build Website for Sales & Buzz (channel)
›Test pricing (revenue)
Lessons Learned ////////////////////////////////////

31. MVP build out
w Set up for all users
w Cleaned up images
w Added more names
w Spanish Version

32. ersonalized can be personalized for We help develop into creating suprising Parents
or games digital devices thinking skills in nuggets of joy. parents t
n's interest Have wide amount of children & strenghten Building a brand that is savy. Ha
often and it is content on the site social ties by letting admired and worth phones o
nsuming for parents put the talking about facebook
Have stories that focus
to get new important people, (Hopefully) their chil
on social values places, and events into Family M
Offer service to create the stories their who wan
to find stories personalized stories children create. the child
ch the right
alues Seedling
Key Metric Distribution intereste
n love to see Channels
ves in stories Customers purchasing content o
t do so. stories Aesopsgarden.com Groups -
Every customer Customers Sharing teams th
bringing us three new Group stories teach som
customers! seedlings
tructure Revenue $treams
er Acqusitions - Free Individual Stories and Games accessible at $6 -
lustration - $300? Custom story creation as a service - Individuals
ees or hosting fees - ? Free trial

33. Referral
Build it in
w Craft Activity
w Art Thank You Card
w Showcasing Testimonials

34. Sticking to Values

35. Next Steps
Easter Eggsplained
Get Commitments with a sneak

36. Questions??
emiliano@aesopsgarden.com
www.aesopsgarden.com