From time immemorial, creativity has always fascinated mankind. Although early theories of creativity links it with the divine inspiration, it is only in the twentieth century that creativity models and theories started to flourish with strong linkage to personal attributes, intelligence and business connection.
The creative thinking techniques very soon led to a more scientific way of tackling problems, and design thinking was born to provide a particular approach to creatively solve problems. The term suffers from misconceptions relating it to design solutions, attributing it to either art or science. However in reality design thinking has actually evolved beyond space and time to provide solutions to a problem with a certain amount of human understanding in a given environment.
The success story of Wimco’s Homelites clearly reflects the application of design thinking in shaping business strategy and helping business forge ahead with strong understanding of customer behaviour.
The WIMCO HOMELITE’s Story
1977 – Wimco Homelites had a dominant 29 per cent market share (by volume) and growth was satisfactory. However, following a shift in government policy, production was reserved for the cottage sector. Wimco's production capacity was frozen at 5,000 million match boxes per year. That, plus the excise burden tilted the odds against Wimco. One indication of the impact of these steps: the company's share dropped to 17 per cent by volume in the Rs 400-crore match market.
Fast forward to 1988 - the sales graph of Wimco Homelites continued to climb steadily, touching a high of Rs 75 lakh in Feb 1989. Thereafter, the product went steadily from strength to strength and can be truly regarded as the first national brand in the match industry. In 1990, the company had targeted sales of Homelites at Rs 13 crore. A far cry indeed from June 1987 when national sales were Rs 6 lakhs.
Wimco’s Homelites’ success is a clear testimony of how Wimco implemented design thinking to strategise a turnaround, based on Innovation and Business Development.
And friends, what a lovely illustration of the tenets of Design Thinking this is
Empathy – Design Thinking starts with this basic premise of human understanding of what the other person is feeling / experiencing within their frame of reference.
Wimco’s market research revealed that of total sales, as much as 80 percent was contributed by urban areas. And 70 percent of the matches consumed there, were for household use (through grocers) while only 30 percent went into the pockets of smokers (via pan shops). It was logical, therefore, to concentrate further efforts at higher value addition in this segment.
Empathy brought Wimco to the following realisation - while the urban housewives have budgetary constraints, and scrutinizes costs, this factor is cancelled out by her quality consciousness and look out for safety parameters. She also tends to be more brand aware than the urban male smoker who is indifferent, will ask for a matchbox, any matchbox and almost never by name.
Define – Once empathy is realised, the next step in Design thinking is defining the solution.
Drawing from the market research and understanding of consumer behaviour, Wimco decided to create and sell the concept of longer match sticks to the discerning housewife who cares for quality and is willing to pay for it
Ideate – Now having defined the requirements, Wimco introduced design parameters that were innovations in the matchstick industry. In the new product, the matchsticks were to be 48mm in length as opposed to the 42mm in an ordinary matchbox. The matchbox design, too would be different, being of the lid top open variety as against the common shell and slide type. To add gloss and take care of wear and tear, the box would be poly laminated.
Consequently, a new brand, "Ship MaxiMatch", was created
Test – Wimco now had reached the fourth stage of Design Thinking. It now had to test its product. Each housewife was given a fortnight in which to try it out and decide what she felt about the product. At the end of the fortnight, while 97 per cent of the housewives had accepted the product concept, an overriding majority also felt that the traditional shell and slide model was preferable. Eighty per cent of them felt that the new match was safer than the regular one.
Prototype – Having successfully tested its product concept and design, Wimco launched a prototype product under the new brand name Homelites, with a modern pack design. This was done to give the new matchbox an up-market image which would set it apart from the generic identity of matchboxes and create a brand pull. Wimco decided to first introduce Homelites with 300 sticks. Three months later, a smaller box under the same brand name, was introduced with just 50 lights. This was to fit the purchase pattern of housewives who did not buy matches in bulk. The 50-sticks pack also offered convenience of usage. Smokers were not targeted at all though time was to show that they would come in as bonus consumers.
Now having successfully driven innovation and business development through Design Thinking, it was now time for FEEDBACK.
The initial response was enthusiastic. But marketing tragedy, when it stuck, came from a totally unexpected direction.
To add gloss and to take care of wear and tear, the 300s box had been poly laminated, and the friction was stuck on only after the poly-lamination process. But within days, letter of complaint started trickling in. The grievance was common: the friction was coming off after using only about a hundred sticks. What did the company expect housewives to do with the remaining 200 sticks? And did the company expect consumers to pay a premium price for a product which wasn't even as good as the usual matchbox (friction surface too inadequate to light all the sticks)?
Wimco was now facing consumer rejection, which was frighteningly strong. The morale of the sales force, which had to face the wrath of the retailers, was abysmally low. Even if the quality problem was solved and the price reduced, would the consumer give Homelites another chance? The consumer found itself pushed into a corner. Its market share in the regular matchbox segment was becoming difficult to hold. Product differentiation possibilities were increasingly limited. But if this product was withdrawn from the market - and the company admitted defeat - what other alternatives did it have for the future?
Design Thinking was again brought in, with a definite solution in mind. One thing was sure that if higher value addition was the solution, the answer lay in Homelites. So, Wimco put in all it had to make Homelites succeed. To begin with, a massive exercise was undertaken to withdraw Homelites
form over two lakh outlets across the country (Empathy). Poly-lamination was done away with, and the price of the 300s reduced drastically to Rs.2. (Define and Ideate).
Wimco relaunched Homelites in July 1987, and sales soon started picking up. Over 1988, the sales graph continued to climb steadily, touching a high of Rs 75 lakh in Feb 1989.
And the rest is history….
As we look around we see that Design Thinking as a concept has crossed many milestones and have evolved as a time-tested tool in helping business scale new heights. Take the case of the MR scanner designed by GE Healthcare to scan children in hospitals. On it’s launch, it was soon discovered that the scanner petrified children in the formidable environment it operated in. This made the scanning process tedious, repetitive and even terrifying, including the parents. GE Healthcare revisited and realised that if it could create an environment of awe and splendour, the same activity of scanning could be made more pleasurable.
Thus the company built various themes around the MR scanner environment, like children in an airbag under the glitzy starlit sky, to help them have a memorable experience as they go through the painful process of scanning. This was a runaway success, helping the company spurt the sales of MR scanner.
The examples are galore, but one thing is for sure - Design Thinking has left an indelible mark in the way Companies do business.
