Dear Students,
Great discussion on the Threadless case today!!!. Many of you have participated well and discussed the pros and cons of this business models. Please point out the key takeaways for you and specifically address this question:
What features or parts of this model do you see of value to incorporate into the new model that you would be proposing next week to the Berkeley Innovation Forum Executives for feedback?
The Threadless case demonstrated that you can create an online business ecosystem that serves as a “digital bridge” between the company and its customers and partners. Digital bridges are necessary to enable continuous feedback to iterate on value creation, i.e. the designers could continuously improve on their work by engaging in feedback with the larger Threadless community. By the end of the product development process, customers had become co-creators, invested in the success of the product.
I found this extremely applicable to our proposed elements for Coke’s business model, because we similarly want to enable continuous participation and ownership by customers (business units, bottlers) and partners (key influencers within the company) in the development/adoption of new technologies. Personal relationships within Coke often enable accelerated tech adoption — if we can drive the same level of engagement and relationship-building via our Internal Innovation Forum meetings and online platform, we can help transform the tech innovation process.
I learnt from the Threadless case the value that can be created by forming a community around a product. The goodwill increases the value of the intangible assets the firm and the firm’s value as a whole. Also I think it is great that Threadless is a relatively asset light company, as they only product goods that are definitely demanded by the customers. I believe that we can use it in our Wipro business model. Firstly, our modular approach in implementing Smart City protocols will allow us to choose the module that is most in demand by cities, allowing us to reduce cost and avoid unnecessary services. Secondly, we should leverage the community responses that could be generated by our data and create an engaging platform that allows citizens to communicate with the governments, and demand necessary changes in city planning.
Threadless has an incredibly unique and smart business model particularly because they have created a win-win situation for all participants. The greatest takeaway from this case study is that in order to succeed and to stand out from the competition it’s important to form a community and create an ecosystem. Threadless has created a large community and provided a creative outlet for all these designers who want to share their artwork and as mentioned in lecture this community will outlive the company. This aspect of ‘community’ is key to our Fujitsu challenge because in order for us to successfully pitch our idea we need to be able to convince the Fujitsu executives that our service benefits more than just the students. We need to show how all participants (universities, local vendors, large corporations, etc) can all capture value from our business model. Lastly the idea of crowdsourcing is a feature I would like to incorporate into our model because Threadless has demonstrated the successfulness of allowing their customers to control what products are made and sold.
Threadless is a great model to combine business profits with social goods. I think by bring together the community of artists and uses their talents and creations to sell shirts. The business model is great for our Fujitsu project and I’ve been thinking about the justification of social goods. By promoting the idea of enhanced higher education to more students and create a platform for everyone involved with higher education, it is similar to how Threadless is doing in terms of social goods. Also, Threadless is a great lesson to measure how to interact and communicate with the community. You need to be more friendly and open to questions, and have the heart to serve the community. It would be a great lesson for Fujitsu too.
Threadless is an interesting company because of their open business model in general. I believe one of the most imporant reasons to their sucess is the open, collaborative and sharing relationship they have with their community. They clearly state that it is of greatest importance for them to listen to the community and act as ambassadors for them. In one way it can be seen as the founders of the company are hired by the people to run a collectively managed company.
With this in mind it is interesting to think of the similarities with Wipro’s challenge. For a city to be smart it has to include and engage its citizens in the adaption process. They way to do this as smoothly and efficient as possible is probably to get the citizens onboard and to feel that they are part of a new cool movement. Therefore, Wipro and the government in charge need to find a way to make this to an inspiring implementation that engaged the citizend rather than just run over them with unwelcome policies.
After delving deeper into the case it appeared that the Threadless situation paralleled Coke’s current situation. My biggest takeaway was the importance of breaking boundaries, or, to be more specific, making partners customers and making customers partners. In the Threadless case the designers and consumers were one and the same: designers not only showcased their graphics, but also purchased garments created by “competitors”; consumers purchased unique designs and aided in the overall creation process. This idea of blending these two parties is important for Coke’s business model because by introducing the technological implementation to their customers (bottlers, directors, etc.) early on, they are able to become partners in the process. For Coke, when these important executives fit both divisions, they are more inclined to help expedite the process during our proposed Innovation Forum meetings. If the implementation process is quicker, then both Coke and the bottlers are able to capture value faster. All in all, this is a win-win situation for both sides.
The Threadless business model is such a success because it facilitates the co-creation of products. The most powerful aspect of the model is how connected the Threadless team is to its community of designers and consumers. The moment the community does not approve of a feature, the Threadless team changes it right away. Being able to know what your consumer wants and needs is important when building a business model.
The United Healthcare rewards platform will facilitate the co-creation of user’s health. United Healthcare gives points to individuals who complete health tasks and with those points users may support other user’s health goals. This give to give model would create a sustainable eco-system if the users keep on coming back. Once a user never has to pay a co-pay again or for a gym membership, they will keep coming back. The customer voice feature will become useful in sensing what extra rewards the users will want so they continue to engage. We could also give users more points towards their goal if they sign up their friends or create groups.
Threadless is a really interesting company with a disruptive business model. From my perspective, the company works because it has reevaluated and challenged the conventional business of selling t-shirt. It has successfully increased engagement of customers and designers in a very unique way. Through a collaborative effort, both customers and designers can achieve a great sense of satisfaction and entitlement over the products. The competitive setup of the model encourages designers to think outside the box and understand the needs and demands of customers in great detail. Furthermore, I find it really amazing how sustainable the business model is. Even without the company, the model will still provide as an online platform for customers and designers to interact and collaborate.
The main key takeaway that I want to bring into J&J’s digital platform is the sustainable aspect of the model. We should be suggesting an online patient engagement platform that will not only benefit J&J’s R&D, product development and improvement; our main long-term goal is to equip J&J with a digital platform that can benefit the larger healthcare ecosystem, sustainable for the use of every party regardless of J&J’s strict role in continuously building and overseeing the platform.
I found the threadless case really inspiring, particularly as my peers mentioned how the community that they formed was so impressive. I loved it when they said that even if the company fails the community will stay as I think that this is a goal that all companies should pursue; it is a philosophy that makes the customers engage with the business. Moreover, I liked the idea of making a product unique but especially the feedback they have with the customers. It is a special relationship when the customers and designers work together to make a quality product. As someone pointed out in class, if they were to sell amongst the big retailers they would lose their essence and this is because their success lays in the online community.
Regarding the application of this model to our own business model, I think we can take a lot of positive insights, especially the relationship they have with the customers and the passion they put into having fun and promoting good values. I believe GE should also focus in social goals in addition to profitable objectives.
Threadless case is a very interesting case on digital platform. Threadless provides and facilitates a platform where designers and customers interact and create greater value than they can do individually. This open innovation model incorporates economies of scale and economies of scope. The engaged community also allows the business model to be sustainable. I think this case ties back to when we talked about the 30% vs 70% of the pie for platform model and that the platform model is sustainable and expansionary.
I think what we can incorporate into J&J’s model is to create value TOGETHER WITH the customers. We want to create a patient engagement platform J&J involving everyone in healthcare system. However, this platform cannot be created only with J&J’s effort. Involving all the parties and generating new ideas and greater value through the discussions is our goal.
Threadless has succesfully established a virtual business community. Threadless has succeded because its virtual platform (website) turned into a virtual community that does two things: collaborates to create a valuable product (value creation) and launches the careers of unknown designers (pie expansion).
A few takeaways from the Threadless case:
– Virtual communities can be formed by product designers, end-users and middlemen (and company stakeholders in general).
– Virtual communities allow for instant feedback between product designers and end-users.
– Virtual communities can be a strong ally in the value creation process.
– Business concepts are as strong as the communities they create (“even if the company dies, the community will live on.”)
For our UH project, the concetp of virtual community is particularly important since our whole project is based creating a virtual community that will hold each other motivated to stay healthy (i.e. do regular check-ups, exercise, etc.) and hold each other accountable in a Facebook-esque environment in order to earn Healthy Reawards (a.k.a money). However, our product concept only involves the end-user -unlike Threadless who includes everyone. An idea I got from Threadless hollistic integration is that we could include a feedback protocol that enables end-users to design next year’s rewards program. UH could take this feedback and use to design a rewards program that is more valuable for end-users.
Unlike many of my peers, I have a bit of a different perspective/opinion on Threadless. Answering Prof. Darwin’s final question – “Is it needed?” – my answer would be no. I don’t think Threadless solves a dire “problem” in the industry. Instead, it serves a purpose of uniting together designers and consumers, giving each a platform to voice their preferences and designs. However, I think Threadless is a phenomenal example of how communities are difficult to replicate, and can serve as the barriers to entry into an industry. Many have tried to copy Threadless’ business model, which on the surface seems quite simple to do. However, the real value is in the community, and as the founders mentioned themselves, “Even if Threadless disappeared, the community would remain.”
If one is building a social enterprise, I think the most important component is having a community that is as well knit, as Threadless’ is.
Threadless may not be needed to solve a dire problem per say, but it is a wonderful avenue for individuals who like to design in their free time to share their designs and receive validity/rewards for them. Threadless created a platform for these designers and consumers to come together and essentially co-create t-shirt designs. However, Threadless not only created a platform to facilitate this co-creation process but also a community. I found the case very inspiring as to the significance of building a community around a service or product since that is where the real value and strength of Threadless lies, as Kaushal mentioned.
One of our main value propositions for GE is building a strong community between patients and health clinics so that they are internally motivated to receive routinely checkups. We are aiming to create the ecosystem and digital bridge to support this community through significant partnerships with GE Transportation, Apollo Hospitals, a broadband company, and Indian Railways.
For me one of the main takeaways about the Threadless’ business model is how they build their community and how a strong community can make the business model sustainable. For Fujitsu this a really good takeaway and we will apply it by building a strong and sustain community and ecosystem, where customers and partners have the feeling of belonging, and also by including peer learning in our platform in order to empower our customers so they would feel part of this higher education “family”.
The Threadless case showed us once again how successful an open business model can be. The centerpiece in their business model is the community, where designers and costumers meet to share knowledge and feedback. The management knows how important they are for Threadless successes and continuously listen to the feedback and implementing suggested changes. Adding a community part to Wipro’s business model can be really beneficial to both them and the city. Citizens can shed light on their pain points in the city and Wipro can quickly address them. But also learn from the experience and use that knowledge when working with similar cities in the future.
I participated in today’s discussion extensively. That’s one of many lessons to be learned from Threadless, a small company whose fast growth offers big ideas for how organizations and their leaders may work in the future. Threadless churns out dozens of new products a month—with no advertising, no professional designers, no sales or marketing costs.
My biggest takeaway from this discussion was that the brand is the community. Working side by side doing something that matters – that is the reason for Threadless’ vibrant community. This idea may be more apparent in Threadless’ case but it’s not less true for other brands. All around the world, businesses are intentionally creating communities. And the really surprising thing – often times the community is worth more than the business itself. Community is really important to us at Healthy Rewards and we hope to carry the lessons from this enjoyable case study through the semester!